Desert butterflies

Deb Bisa, currently volunteering at Cravens Peak, has noted a few butterfly sightings during her stay since early November.

A butterfly list was compiled for the reserve in 2007 and published in the 2009 Cravens Peak Scientific Study conducted by the Royal Queensland Geographic Society. A total of 16 species were recorded.

One of Deb’s sightings has been a male Clearwing Swallowtail (Cressida cressida) that was ‘netted’ after a long period of windy days.

This species has predominantly a coastal distribution where its food plants occur, and occasional vagrants reach inlands areas.

Deb sent a photograph of the recently deceased butterfly to Dr Michael Braby, who confirmed Deb’s observation of a range extension for this species.

Insects are often overlooked but are a primary contributor to food chains. Taxa are recorded in the Bush Heritage properties database but butterflies for Cravens Peak have not yet been added – another job for the future!