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2023 - The Year That Was

Places impact you for a variety of reasons. And the same place impacts different people in different ways. This is especially true when it comes to spiritual experiences, where every single person’s experience is unique. And personally, every spiritual experience is unique, the same person can have different deeply spiritual experiences at different places, at different times. This thought has emerged because of my own experiences over the years, but especially so this year, with different and unique experiences at various places I have visited recently. I began this year with a visit to Baroda (Vadodara) with friends. It was meant to be a relaxed trip, a touristy trip, with our sons. We enjoyed ourselves to the hilt, but the highlight of that trip was a visit to the Lakulisha temple at Pavagadh. It was the iconography of the temple that I connected with, and I spent a few hours simply lost in the details of the figures carved around the temple. There was an indefinable connect with
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Danaid Eggfly


The more I see the more I learn, and the more I learn, the more I want to see..... 



On our Sunday visit to MNP, these butterflies were all over the place, and in fact, they seemed least bothered about us, and landed very near us, apparently in no hurry to leave....I felt they were just waiting to be photographed. Almost everyone there who had a camera took photos of these butterflies fluttering around.....
When I started writing my post about the Urban Leaves visit, I thought of mentioning the name of the butterfly, and did a bit of searching..... Much as I tried with all sorts of combinations, I wasn't able to get the exact name. An image search at last brought up some results, and the name there was not butterfly, but 'eggfly'!! I had never heard of this before, so did a search, and viola! there it was - the butterfly I was searching for - It was called the Danaid Eggfly.



Now that I had the name, it was easy to get more information, and it seems that this is quite a common one in India, but it has several interesting characteristics - for one, it is sexually diamorphic, which means that the male and female look completely different. Secondly, they are excellent mimics, which means they appear like butterflies of other species, and can be identified only by a close look. This is especially true of the females, which may look like those of other species, or in a few cases, they can look like the males themselves! Wow! What a means of camouflage!!!! Interesting, isn't it? Do you wonder now that I would love to learn more about these fascinating creatures, and see more of them? Incidentally, I still don't know why they are called 'eggflies' and not butterflies... Any ideas?

For more information, click on the links below..

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  1. AartiJanuary 5, 2013 at 11:39 AM

    Not sure why i dint see this post earlier.. LOVE LOVE LOVE it :))

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Anuradha ShankarJanuary 5, 2013 at 11:59 AM

      I dont know how u missed it, aarti! with ur love for butterflies!

      Delete

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