Delias callista callipulchra FEMALE

[wollastoni]

I have just received that very rare Delias : a female of Delias callista callipulchra from Tembagapura, West Papua, 2005 !



Present in very few collections !

[deliasfanatic]

I've seen very, very few of these...three, I think, if I count this one, and I'm aware of several more.

[wollastoni]

you mean "not aware" ?

[nomad]

Very nice and quite strange the females of even common Delias are so rare today. I expect because everyone collects the mud puddling assemblages. Meek and the Pratts had no trouble collecting females of all the species they encountered but they spent quite a long time in one area and Meek had his own collecting crew out with a net. Another important factor to consider is that when we say collected by Meek, he himself was rarely out with a net except in the lower Snow Mountains and Mount Goliath, most of the Meek Papuan specimens were caught by his native crew and sometimes the locals, while he was busy in his tent setting all the goodies. 

[deliasfanatic]

Jun 10, 2017 5:50:52 GMT wollastoni said:

you mean "not aware" ?

No, I am aware of several females in collections in addition to the two that I have seen personally plus this new one of yours.

[indra]

Jun 10, 2017 8:07:35 GMT nomad said:

Very nice and quite strange the females of even common Delias are so rare today. I expect because everyone collects the mud puddling assemblages. Meek and the Pratts had no trouble collecting females of all the species they encountered but they spent quite a long time in one area and Meek had his own collecting crew out with a net. Another important factor to consider is that when we say collected by Meek, he himself was rarely out with a net except in the lower Snow Mountains and Mount Goliath, most of the Meek Papuan specimens were caught by his native crew and sometimes the locals, while he was busy in his tent setting all the goodies. 

   During my trip to Irian Jaya (W. Papua) back in 1990, at a stop at a location in the Baliem Valley, I noticed some Delias flying in a tree out of my net's reach. A curious young Dani man noticing my efforts grabbed my net and proceeded to climb into the tree. After some frustration of his own, he came back down with 2 nice M and 1F Delias aruna which he handed to me. If I had tried that, I probably would have fallen and broke my neck. Unfortunately, many Delias females stay in the trees near the host plants and tree blossoms and require much effort to obtain unless there are low growing nectar sources nearby. In the Western USA we have Pine Whites (Neophasia menapia and Neophasia terlooii) which can be just as frustrating to collect, especially the females which fly high up in pine trees and occasionally swoop down lower where one can at least get a chance to swing at it. Fortunately, if there is wet ground or nectar sources nearby, they will occasionally come down lower to imbibe.
   By the way I also have a F specimen of D. callista callipulchra in my collection thanks to Norris Pangemanan, the collector. Henk included it as a paratype in his description of the subspecies.
      John G. Pasko

[deliasfanatic]

Mine likewise was collected by Norris, and is a paratype. We're very lucky to have them!

[wollastoni]

Jun 10, 2017 8:07:35 GMT nomad said:

Very nice and quite strange the females of even common Delias are so rare today. I expect because everyone collects the mud puddling assemblages. Meek and the Pratts had no trouble collecting females of all the species they encountered but they spent quite a long time in one area and Meek had his own collecting crew out with a net. Another important factor to consider is that when we say collected by Meek, he himself was rarely out with a net except in the lower Snow Mountains and Mount Goliath, most of the Meek Papuan specimens were caught by his native crew and sometimes the locals, while he was busy in his tent setting all the goodies. 

Sometimes you can be lucky too. Nicolas and Chris found a flowering tree last December and there were MANY females on it ! It seems easy, but those who have been in these forests know how difficult it is to find a flowering trees. I never had this luck during one month in the Baliem for example. Neither on Biak. It happened to me in Sulawesi and I found some good females there (D. surprisa, ...)

Aside from those trees, you have to ignore the mud-puddling males and focus on tree canopy and you may catch one or two females in a good day. Turlin did so in Abmissibil and found some.
Meek and Pratts have caught thousands of males and the few females we now find in our Museums. I am not sure that their % of females were much higher than that of recent expeditions but as they spent a lot of time in the field they brought back a lot of them.

Rare females, rare species, presumably extinct species, non-described species... that's why Delias are so popular among collectors, on top of their beauty and diversity.