Butterfly Named a Banded Awl

It Looks Like a Moth

 

 

There seems to be some confusion in the butterfly experts world; I'm glad I ain't one of them.

If you think bird watchers are crazy, you probably don't want to mess with butterfly fanatics.

It was another rainy day so, I spent a few hours, trying to find a name for this bug.

After looking at only a few hundred thumbnail photos, I thought it was nailed down.

  Banded Awl (Hasora moestissima moestissima) on Flickr gave me a scientific name.

Off I went, plugging that nomenclature into search engines, to get verification.

At Butterflies of Singapore they have the Life History of the Common Banded Awl.

Nice enough people, they call butterflies, Nature's Flying Jewels. Imagine that.

Anyway, the photos show butterflies, that look just like this one.

But, in Singapore the Latin name is Hasora chromus chromus.

Over at Butterfly Circle, they would agree with the Flying Jewel folks in Singapore.

But Nature Society (Singapore) would call the critter Hasore vitta vitta.

It's just a Plain Banded Awl, to them. All the photos, look like the same butterfly, to me.

At Butterflies of India, it's a Hasora vitta indica - India Plain Banded Awl, wouldn't ya know.

We could go on and on, adding links to pictures of butterflies but, I won't.

If you take those scientific names and search, you'll find all kinds of different butterflies.

Half of them, don't look anything like the photo, I posted above.

So, I sat back and tried to picture, all the butterfly experts, coming together.

They'd have field guides, notebooks, binoculars and big butterfly nets in their hands.

There's no telling if, they are violent types of people, when they get in a disagreement.

So, I decided to not try and place any concrete scientific name on this little dude.

Let's call it a Banded Awl that looks like a moth, from now on, for the sake of world peace !

Flower Photos: Odontonema strictum or Firespike

Here's another flower that brightens up the cold winter days on Okinawa.

Like Poinsettia plants, they fire-up the hills with red color, even if the sun doesn't shine.

People gave them all kinds of common names.  

Mexican Firespike, Firespike, Scarlet Flame and Cardinal Guard are a few that I found.

Scientists call them Odontonema strictum.  They aren't regular people, you know.

They would probably kick my butt in a game of Scrabble, I bet.

Science Helps Me Sometimes

 

 

It might have taken all week to get the correct identification of this plant.

Whenever there's a sign like this, alongside a flower I'm shooting, I photograph it, too.

Then, just put Odonto Nema in a search engine and see what pops up.

Those scientific names are used around the world.

They really make it easy to correctly ID wildlife, plants and probably diseases.

So, I guess I shouldn't poke fun at those scientist guys, too much.

They are a lot smarter than me.

But, I think I could beat most of them at chugging alphabet soup.  Hah !

Find out more about Firespike at the University of Florida

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Poinsettia Plants Can Become Humongous

See more of Okinawa's Plants in Trees, Flowers and Ferns