Moth on a shrivelled nest

The photograph above shows a moth resting on the shrivelled nest of an ashy prinia warbler. The leaves are of the creeper "flaming glory bower'.

I have just written a blog on the caterpillar I found on the leaves of the elephant foot yam plant.

Can some one identify whether the moth has metamorphosed from the caterpillar shown? Or are they from different species?

'Instars' after the rains!

This year the rains came late and lingered till end of August. The butterflies and moth caterpillars waste no time in completing their life cycles; Here are some I managed capturing on the lens, in the beginning of September.



The above picture is that of a lime butterfly caterpillar which is probably in its third stage (instar)of moulting. The picture below is that of the same caterpillar after two more moultings. Now it is in its last 'instar' and the next stage will be the pupa and then the lime butterfly. The host plant is the Chinese Orange tree.



If the caterpillars of lime butterfly are fast eaters, they pale in comparison with the moth caterpillar's eating capacity. The picture below is that of the Elephant Yam moth caterpillar. This one could devour huge leaves of the yam plant overnight and was found hiding beneath the leaf during the day. I could not observe this caterpillar in its next stage; probably a mynah or babbler found this packaged fast food irresistible. The caterpillar disappeared sometime during the day.

Education for Sustainability

The talk given by Mr.Kapil Sibal, Union Minister for HRD on 29th July
2009 at Teen Murti house, was really `Manna' to an
environmentalist's ear. The crux of his talk was that
`Environment Education' should be at the center of education,
all other knowledge can follow. All scientific data and processes are
available with nature.

"Bring science into education; all aspects of science can be learnt
from nature. Science taught in correlation with nature is understood
best.

"Education for sustainable development in an era of climate change,
calls for a change in mindsets. The need is to reach out to communities
and have a dialogue. Teachers within the community will have knowledge
at ground level".

" Teaching of a subject must be holistic. Environmental issues can
be effectively linked to say, automobile engineering. Teaching of music
can take off from nature…."

" Communicating with nature creates a sense of preservation of
nature at the heart of education…"

"The government's aim is to connect all villages of India in the
next three years. This can lead to leapfrog in education. We must be
ready with relevant content in the meantime."

Heart of all content is nature.