Butterflies Bangladesh

Butterflies are important pollinators. They are also good indicators of the ecological quality of a habitat. Some butterflies are vital for economically important plants and also general an important component of the food chain. In short, butterflies are benign, aesthetically pleasing, fauna members and not to mention, beautiful to watch as an ornament of Mother Nature. 3

As "cold blooded" insects, butterflies are particularly affected by changes in climate. Numbers are influenced every year by weather patterns, but increases in mean temperatures over a sustained period can lead to significant changes in range, population size, the rate of colonization or extinction, phrenology, number of generations each year, choice of larval monitor change, not just because of its intrinsic interest but because these changes may have considerable implications for conservation management.

A good number of scientific inventories on butterflies of Bangladesh have been prepared in the past one decade. The checklist ranges approximately 400-500 species. The worrying part is that the evidence of these species' existence and distribution are not comprehensive. In most of the cases these checklists prepared to meet the scientific communities' interest, but the engagement of common people or knowledge sharing with them have been overlooked. We have been working for an intensive period on butterfly recording with the help of digital media and information on distribution area covered in Bangladesh. We use common scientific methods of taxonomic key for identification of butterfly species. The inventory is segregated into some focused districts in each phase and ultimately the goal is to cover the whole country with a tentative tenure of 8-10 years.

This inventory encompasses the tenure of September 2009 - January 2012. It includes the geographical area of Dhaka, Mymensingh, Tangail, Netrokana, Rangpur, Gaibandha, Bogra and Syllhet districts. The lokations mainly covered during the documentation were urban and village road sides, botanical gardens, educational institutions, adjacent area of river, lakes, ponds, tea gardens, etc.

A total of 61 species recorded in this initial phase where 22 (NYMPHALIDAE), 3 (PAPILIONIDAE), 10 (PIERIDAE), 16 (LYCAENIDAE) & 10 9HESPERIIDAE) families were found. Out of all these species mostly 56 were commonly found in all these locations. Only 5 species (Appias Olferna, Appias Drusilla, Spindasis lohita Senama, Loxura Atymnus Fuconius, Arhopala Amantes) were found uncommon. These species have been recorded in only one or two districts. In this manuscript, brief explanation of these species are provided, which includes family names, their superseded, scientific names as well as the generally accepted, common names, Furthermore wingspans, colours, habits, larva host plants and geographically recorded locations have also been incorporated. Although utmost care has been taken to present the accurate measure of wingspan, colours, habit and larva host plants but they are prone to variations due to disparities in accordance to regions, site conditions and erratic seasonalities. Physical appearances of the species on the other hand, can very a great deal depending on their age.

Roughly 1,00,000 images were taken during this inventory tenure, where all these species' solitary of taxonomical forms have been captured but due to space limitations of this book, solitary taxonomical outline have been presented for individual species. Although global positioning System (GPS) has been used while taking pictures, marks for these are not incorporated in this book. Moreover image have been scaled and magnified where necessary.

Indeed, we have tried our best to make this publication helpful for both scholars and general leaders.

"Upho;ding the ecology and conservation of flora and fauna species of Bangladesh, though the power of imagery and documentation" -with this belief and motto, we, a group of people, have been working voluntarily with a similar vision for the last one decade.

During our expedition, we have been able to make a healthy documentation" of some species in Bangladesh which includes rare and threatened flora, medicinal plants, dragonflies, lizards frogs, birds along with butterflies and moths.

The book Butterflies of Bangladesh is a compilation of our first phase inventory with the endeavors of our two and half year's effort where primarily eight districts of Bangladesh were focused. The rest of the geographical locations of Bangladesh will also be enclosed by 8-10 years onward.

The ultimate goal of this initiative is the formulation of an authentic checklist of butterflies in Bangladesh with adequate information which is supposed to play a great role for conservation efforts, not only for the scientific communities, but also for people as a whole.