mistressofmuses (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
mistressofmuses) wrote2021-08-13 09:23 pm
mistressofmuses) wrote2021-08-13 09:23 pm
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The Butterfly Pavilion
A few days late! But on Tuesday we went to The Butterfly Pavilion, which is a zoo dedicated to invertebrates of various types. It was a nice indoor option for something to do despite the bad air.
I was an intern there for about six months, doing a weird research project on cataloguing and sorting some of the preserved collections. Mostly I wound up being pulled to work the floor, so I don't think I really wound up doing... much of my intended project, but it was still a neat experience. At the time I'd been hoping to go into museum studies, which clearly never happened.
Anyway, I hadn't been back since, so it was interesting to return. Parts have definitely changed, while other things have stayed pretty consistent.
Of course, butterflies are the main attraction.
But my favorite picture of the day: there's an octopus, now!
The first room (which we did a quick skim through and then left to wait out a school group of screaming children, but then returned to) has most of the "creepy crawlies." It's where the big spiders and non-butterfly insects are. There's a beehive with some clear panels so you can see the bees at work, and it's also where you can hold "Rosie" the rosehair tarantula. (Secretly there is a whole ROOM of Rosies, a couple hundred of them, so that they don't have to be handled for too long. At any sign of stress, or if it's just been too long, they get swapped out.)
A green-bottle blue tarantula. This one isn't the most vibrant of the species I've seen, but it's still pretty neat.
Dead-leaf mantis, which does look quite a bit like a dead leaf.
And a pink-toe! Look at the little sticky feets!
After that is the water section.
I don't know if you can tell just how SMALL this baby sea star is. There were a bunch, so something must have spawned, lol. But they were so tiny!
A shrimp!
A slipper lobster!
Another picture of the octopus (and a bat star), because it was very neat. (Shortly after, it climbed up over that ledge above it, and went behind into its little cave.)
And there is a touch pool: a leather star, bat star, and keyhole limpet. A second pool has a horseshoe crab and a sea urchin, though I didn't get pictures of them.
And of course, the main appeal is the butterflies. There's a large conservatory full of free-flying butterflies, which is just wonderful to walk through.
This isn't the greatest picture, but it sure did capture that wild color!
A morpho, with wings open for a change!
A small red butterfly.
Nicely sitting.
"This is harassment!" I think the in-motion one wanted to get on making more butterflies, but mostly it just kept ineffectually bonking into the other one, lol.
Orange and black.
And the chrysalis board. The one to the left-middle, where you can see the pattern, kept wiggling a little bit. I bet the butterfly emerged that night. :)
There were definitely a few pictures that I THOUGHT looked good when I was there, but turned out to be a bit blurry, alas. But at least some came out well!
I was an intern there for about six months, doing a weird research project on cataloguing and sorting some of the preserved collections. Mostly I wound up being pulled to work the floor, so I don't think I really wound up doing... much of my intended project, but it was still a neat experience. At the time I'd been hoping to go into museum studies, which clearly never happened.
Anyway, I hadn't been back since, so it was interesting to return. Parts have definitely changed, while other things have stayed pretty consistent.
Of course, butterflies are the main attraction.
But my favorite picture of the day: there's an octopus, now!
The first room (which we did a quick skim through and then left to wait out a school group of screaming children, but then returned to) has most of the "creepy crawlies." It's where the big spiders and non-butterfly insects are. There's a beehive with some clear panels so you can see the bees at work, and it's also where you can hold "Rosie" the rosehair tarantula. (Secretly there is a whole ROOM of Rosies, a couple hundred of them, so that they don't have to be handled for too long. At any sign of stress, or if it's just been too long, they get swapped out.)
A green-bottle blue tarantula. This one isn't the most vibrant of the species I've seen, but it's still pretty neat.
Dead-leaf mantis, which does look quite a bit like a dead leaf.
And a pink-toe! Look at the little sticky feets!
After that is the water section.
I don't know if you can tell just how SMALL this baby sea star is. There were a bunch, so something must have spawned, lol. But they were so tiny!
A shrimp!
A slipper lobster!
Another picture of the octopus (and a bat star), because it was very neat. (Shortly after, it climbed up over that ledge above it, and went behind into its little cave.)
And there is a touch pool: a leather star, bat star, and keyhole limpet. A second pool has a horseshoe crab and a sea urchin, though I didn't get pictures of them.
And of course, the main appeal is the butterflies. There's a large conservatory full of free-flying butterflies, which is just wonderful to walk through.
This isn't the greatest picture, but it sure did capture that wild color!
A morpho, with wings open for a change!
A small red butterfly.
Nicely sitting.
"This is harassment!" I think the in-motion one wanted to get on making more butterflies, but mostly it just kept ineffectually bonking into the other one, lol.
Orange and black.
And the chrysalis board. The one to the left-middle, where you can see the pattern, kept wiggling a little bit. I bet the butterfly emerged that night. :)
There were definitely a few pictures that I THOUGHT looked good when I was there, but turned out to be a bit blurry, alas. But at least some came out well!
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BUTTERFLIES AND OCTOPUS!!!!!!!!
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I think spiders are super cute! <3