Consultancy
Butterfly Conservation Project(s)
Many have approached us and expressed their interest in raising butterflies for commercial purposes or simply for a hobby and yet many get discourage with the length of the project duration once they read our proposal. A lot of people when they come us, they always envision a large enclosure with a nice garden full of flowers, plants and butterflies that they can build and finish in just a short period of time. When I tell them to forget building a structure to enclose the butterflies, which I find an unnecessary expense in the beginning of the project, most of them walk away. That’s completely fine with me because I wouldn’t do a project that I know is doomed to fail. What many don’t realize is the first step in encouraging a butterfly population in their area is to rebuild their habitat. A lot of people are complaining that they don’t see butterflies anymore flying around, unlike when they were young. That’s because forests, valleys, hills, bushes have been cleared for residential and commercial use. The heavy use of pesticides in commercial farming has also hurt the butterfly population.
Enclosing the butterflies in a structure that does not have adequate amount of their host plants is simply not sustainable. Sadly, this is the usual scenario in most of the commercial butterfly gardens in the Philippines I’ve been to. Most of them have struggled to keep an ideal butterfly population inside the structure and the limited number of butterflies hardly impresses the tourists at all. Normally, most of these butterfly gardens are under populated because they simply didn’t develop a production facility to sustain its demand. Constant reliance on butterfly farmers like us for adequate supply of butterflies inside the garden is simply not cost efficient on their operations. We can’t emphasize enough the importance of planting and propagating the host plants of butterflies that will sustain their population. Butterfly ranching is the simplest yet most effective way of carrying out butterfly conservation projects. Butterfly ranching means developing a large portion of land as plantation of the host plants of caterpillars and adult butterflies.
Together Father Francisco Perez, we have developed a small portion of property behind the Jesuit Residence in Ateneo De Manila University as an experimental butterfly garden to see if we can revive and sustain the butterfly population in an urbanized area like Quezon City. After two years of Father Perez’ hardwork and our guidance we are happy that species like Danaus Chrysippus, Idea Leuconoe, Pachliopta Kotzebouea, Papilio Demeleous, Papilio Polytes and the CITES listed specie Troides Rhadamanthus have made the Ateneo University campus their home all year round. We still have to work on the host plants of Parthenos Sylvia and Cethosia Biblis since they are not adaptable to soil type around the campus but in due time, the Ateneo Campus will be their home too. There are still a lot to do but with patience, dedication and hardwork, we will succeed in completely reviving the butterfly population in the area.
Raising butterflies requires hardwork and dedication. It is the most tedious and time consuming job on earth but your efforts will always be rewarded by the joy of seeing right before your eyes the several stages of metamorphosis that the butterflies goes through and I believe that’s an invaluable experience that you can’t put any price tag on.
We provide technical assistance and technology transfer to anyone who wishes to dedicate their time and resources in creating a butterfly sanctuary. It is our social responsibility to build/rebuild first their habitat before we think of profiting from them.
