Farming the Flying Gems for Rural Livelihood and the Environment! : THEIR USES, CONSERVATION STATUS AND PROTECTION OF HABITATS

Panchito M. Labay FORD Fellow FORD Foundation International Fellowships Program email: [email protected] mobile phone: 09208597698

Abstract

Butterflies have been instrumental in the conservation of tropical forests, development and promotion of rural economies through ecotourism and farming and in various scientific studies with regard to flora-fauna interactions, biotic-abiotic relationships, population dynamics and climate change. In this particular paper about Philippine butterflies, their uses, conservation status and habitat protection information are presented in support to the burgeoning economic use of butterflies as source of rural environment and rural or ‘green tourism’. The paper reviews the taxonomic classification of butterflies, especially those found in the Philippines, particularly in Marinduque. Their local larval- and nectar-host plants are also discussed as they are related to butterfly farming and forest / ecosystem conservation and protection. Focused discussion on butterfly farming / cultivation, processing and marketing, mostly in Marinduque are also presented, especially the marketing trends from 1993 to 2005. The brief social history of the livelihood is also added to serve as inspiration to the ‘would be’ butterfly farmers. To make it more wholesome, the presentation also includes the butterfly species’ seasonal distribution, problems affecting their biodiversity, like parasitism and predation and some related butterfly-plant-predator interaction chemistry for more information. Finally, the paper primarily aimed to showcase the benefits of butterfly farming for enthusiasts, environmentalists, educators and rural folks as well.

Keywords: biodiversity, butterfly farming, butterfly species, green tourism, larval-host plants, Marinduque, nectar-host plants, rural livelihood.

Introduction

Nature is the home of biodiversity—the rich species of flora and fauna where they depend each other. It produces renewable resources and ecological services to mankind. It is the hope of about one billion (ITTO, 2000) to 1.6 billion (Djoghlaf, 2008), who are living in or near its forests and slopelands to extract and farm food for survival.

Since nature is treated as a common resource by many, its exploitation to be of service to mankind is practiced for millennia. People modified it into agricultural lands for food production (Colchester & Lohmann, 1993), which is generally devoted to single or few crops of introduced species. Thus, agriculture along side with mining and logging are considered as one of the destructive forces to nature (Shanahan & Masood, 2004; WWF, 1997). Those species that are highly appropriated for their economic values are heavily exploited or extracted and those not appropriated with economic value are considered ‘useless’ or ‘minor species’ and therefore not

Butterfly Farming : The Flying Gems Page 1 generally protected. With these spiralling activities, nature’s forests are continuously disappearing worldwide at a rate of 17 million hectares per year (FAO, 1995) to 20.4 million hectares per year (Bryant, Nielsen & Tangley, 1997).

The tropical forests that lie mostly in the lower latitude of the Earth are one of the world’s most diverse ecosystems, where almost 80% of biodiversity can be found (Mogato, Crimmins & Crabb, 2008)

The Philippines is one of the places of the world’s centre for nature with high biodiversity. Thus, it is one of the world’s ‘megadiversity centre’ (Fernando, et al., 2003; Mittermeier, Myers & Mittermeier, 2004).

On the other hand, it is also considered as ‘biodiversity hotspot’ where over 57 percent of major flora and fauna of the world can be found (Oliver & Heaney, 1996). It has exceptional endemism, because the percentage of its endemic species is higher than any other biogeographic region in the Indo-Malayan Realm (Heaney & Regalado, 1998; Holloway, 2003; Mey, 2003; Mittermeier, Myers & Mittermeier, 2004; Myers, et al., 2000).

Invertebrate endemism, particularly the dominate the Philippine ecosystem. Of the nearly 21,000 inventoried species of insects, they were found belonging to 27 orders, 499 families and 6,185 genera. Of the 27 orders, they were composed of 35.2 percent Coleoptera (beetles), 14.3 percent Hymenoptera (ants, bess, wasps) and 13.84 percent (butterflies, skippers, moths) (Gapud, 2005).

Its over-all endemism range from 44 percent to 87 percent and was reported to be 69.8 percent. They are further classified into: 35.7 percent neuropteroids (beetles, twisted-winged flies, antlions, lacewings, owlflies), 29.3 percent panorpoids (flies, flea, butterflies, moths, caddisflies), 14.3 percent hymenopteroids (ants, bees, wasps), 14.2 percent hemipteroids (Barklice, thrips, lice, planthoppers, leafhoppers, cicadas, true bugs), 4.8 percent orthopteroids (grasshoppers, katydids, crickets, pygmy locusts, preying mantis, stick insects, earwings, stoneflies, termites, roaches, webspinners), 1.5 percent palaeopterids (mayflies, damselflies, dragonflies) and the rest comprise 0.25 percent (Ballentes, Mohagan, Gapud, et al., 2006; Gapud, 2005).

Focusing in on butterflies, the same high pattern of endemism was observed, even on islands with few hundred square kilometres size (Holloway, 2003). Therefore, studies on butterflies in the Philippine islands with more than 7,000 islands are very challenging, because until now little research has been published on Philippine butterflies.

Inventory studies are still patchy, thus far from being complete (Baltazar, 1991). New species and sub-species, as well as their larval food plants have to be discovered and re-examined as their distributions also change through time (BOSTID, 1981; Danielsen & Treadaway, 2004; Holloway, 2003; Isaac, Mallet & Mace, 2004).

Furthermore, like other species, the Philippine butterflies are not isolated from problems of population decline, loss of habitats and fragmentation, predation and mass extraction for economic purposes. Thus, this paper presents topics about Philippine butterflies, their uses and status with focus on butterfly farming or cultivation, especially in the province of Marinduque.

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Review of Systematics and Cladistics of Butterflies

Butterflies and moths are both classified under Division Ditrysia, Class Insecta and Order Lepidoptera. The latest systematic (taxonomical diversification) and cladistic (hierarchical phylogeny and evolutionary ancestry) classification of them still remain.

Order Lepidoptera is considered as one of the most ‘speciose orders’, estimated to have more than 180,000 species in 128 families and 47 superfamilies worldwide (Wikipedia, 2009a). It is considered to have the largest number of species as compared to the three other big Orders of the clade, such as Hymonoptera, Diptera and Coleoptera.

Table 1. Number of ‘known’ butterfly species worldwide per family, tribe and genera. Superfamily / Family Subfamily Tribe No. Genera No. spp. HESPERIOIDEA [3,500] Hesperiidae Coeliadinae 8 75 Pyrrhopyginae 20 150 Pyrginae 160 1,000 Heteropterinae 16 150 Trapezitinae 16 60 Hesperiinae 325 >2,000 PAPILIONOIDEA [14,000] Papilionidae Baroniinae 1 1 Parnassiinae 8 54-76 Papilioninae 17 550 Pieridae Dismorphiinae 6 100 Pseudopontinae 1 1 Pierinae 55 700 Coliadinae 12 250 Riodininae 140 1,250 Poritiinae 47 530 Miletinae 18 150 Curetinae 1 18 Lycaeninae 500 4,000 Nymphalidae Libytheinae 2 12 Heliconiinae 40 400 Nymphalinae 60 350 Limenitinae 100 >1,000 Charaxinae 28 400 Apaturinae 20 430 Morphinae 40 230 Satyrinae 280 2,400 Calinaginae 1 8 Danainae Danaini 11 162 Tellervini 1 6 Ithomiini 50 >300

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HEDYLOIDEA [40] Hedylidae 1 40 BUTTERFLIES IN TOTAL [1,985] [17,500] Source: Lepidoptera Taxome Project (2002, 2004), Robbins & Opler (1997)

Others classified butterflies and moths into Rhopalocera and Heterocera respectively (Wikipedia, 2009b). The former is further divided into three superfamilies, such as Papilionoidea (true butterflies), Hesperioidea (skippers) and Hedyloidea (American moth butterflies) (Ackery, de Jong & Vane-Wright, 1999; Tree of Life Web Project, 2008).

The Papilionoidea or "true" butterflies are composed of five families-Papilionidae, Pieridae, Nymphalidae, Riodinidae and Lycaenidae (Brower, 2008; Wahlberg, Braby & Brower, 2008).

The existing number of ‘scientifically described’ butterfly species in the world is also confusing. Some estimated it to be 13,700 (Robbins, 1982), 17,116 (Hoskins, 2007), 17,500 (Lepidoptera Taxome Project, 2004; Robbins & Opler, 1997).

The Status of Philippine Butterflies

With the on-going ‘taxonomic inflation’ of species worldwide (Isaac, Mallet & Mace, 2004), the total number of butterfly species in the country will be also changed through time. Some reports pegged it to 890 species and 900 subspecies (Gapud, 2005), others reported 910 species (Conservation International, 2008) and 915 species and 910 subspecies (Danielsen & Treadaway, 2004). Of the known species, one-third of them were found endemic (Ballentes, Mohagan, Gapud, et al., 2006; Conservation International, 2008).

Out of 915 known species, 133 were considered as globally threatened and 71 percent of them do not have stable population within the 18 identified protected areas. A total of 29 taxa is endangered or critically endangered; 83 percent of these do not occur within a priority area (Danielsen & Treadaway, 2004).

Despite these impressive records of butterfly species, the Philippines has one of the highest rates of forest loss, declining from 70 percent to 18 percent cover in the last 100 years, and therefore, approximately 60 percent of endemic Philippine flora are now extinct (Heaney & Regalado, 1998).

This spiralling problem has drastic effect on the population of butterflies, which are highly dependent on plants, some species of ants and abiotic conditions, such as temperature, humidity and light.

Population pressure as brought by poverty and paucity of livelihood opportunities, dearth of values and the "open access" to nature thinking, all contribute to the over-exploitation and non- sustainable use of the country’s biodiversity. All these things have reverberating effects to the country’s butterfly species, which experts believe that some have already faced extinction before being studied and identified.

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Uses of Butterflies

Butterflies as ‘bioindicators of good environment’

Environmentally, butterflies are the world’s most colourful insects, which can be observed in diversity of habitats (Smart, 1975; Taylor, 1996). They can easily respond to changes in temperature, humidity and light (Wood & Gillman, 1998). Though adult butterflies prefer basking in full sunlight, majority of them prefer the temperature range of 25oC to 30oC (Novak, 1995). Though they can thermo-regulate their bodies in various ways (Clench, 1966; Huey & Kingsolver, 1989), at temperature higher than 35oC will make them inactive or may aestivate under the leaves of plants and forest trees (Heinrich, 1993). A study revealed that high temperature shortens their life span and their metamorphosis cycle as well (Karlsson & Wiklund, 2005). Butterflies also tend to produce lower number of eggs and generally hatched with smaller sizes (Braby, 1994). Thus, they have been identified as important indicators of disturbances, habitats and as surrogates for other taxa (Grill & Cleary, 2003).

Adult butterflies or imagines and larvae are practicing phytophagy, that is imagines feed on nectar while caterpillars food on leaves of plants. Majority of the larvae are specialists or monophagous, that is their larvae or caterpillars will starve to death rather than eating different species of plants. Thus, the egg-laying imagines are tasting plants with their feet and antennae in finding out the right food plants for their offspring.

As such, a diverse species of butterflies means a diverse species of plants in the area (Fernandez & Andam, 2004; Gilbert, 1984; Lawton, Bignell, Bloemers, et al., 1998).

Furthermore, as specialists, their larvae also live on specific physical conditions to proliferate. Adults or imagines form assemblages or communities, which are specific to each of the geographical and ecological conditions where their food plants thrive (Hammond & Miller, 1998; Hill & Hamer, 1998).

Though ants are considered as primary predators of butterflies (Fielder, Holldobler & Seufert, 1996), some species of them play an important role in the life of butterflies, especially among the Lycaenidae, Riodinidae and some Nymphalidae. The ant-butterfly relationships known as myrmecophagy (Mann, 1999) can be classified as facultative, where a caterpillar can interact with a number of different ant species, but does not necessarily need to be in order survive or obligative, where the caterpillar depends on a specific ant-partner for survival (Seufert & Fiedler, 1996).

When a caterpillar is found attended by ants, usually during its larval stage, the number of ants can vary from one to fifteen. The chief protection the ants provide is against parasitism, while the caterpillar usually (but not always) provides secretions-often of amino acids and carbohydrates (Fielder, Holldobler & Seufert, 1996).

Myrmecophagous species generally lay their eggs near the specific ant colonies or found on plant species that secret foliar nectar that attracts ants themselves (Mann, 1999). This is so, because ants are known to guard plants secreting extra floral nectar (Pierce & Mead, 1981).

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The natural survival of butterflies in the wild is astonishingly low, generally, only one percent of the eggs reach adulthood due to predation, parasitism and of course changes in their habitats (Hoskins, 2007; Novak, 1995).

It is presumed that global climate change can drastically affect their population. As their natural environment changes, population dynamics and predator-prey dynamics will also change (Hammond & Miller, 1998), especially among the forest species that are considered as highly stenotopic, habitat specific and often endemic (Spitzer, Jaros, Havelka & Leps, 1997). In Europe and various parts of the globe, many butterfly species are threatened or are declining rapidly due to loss and fragmentation of their habitats (New, Pyle, Thomas & Hammond, 1995). Therefore, they can serve as good ‘flagship species’ for biodiversity inventories (Lawton, Bignell, Bolton, et al., 1998) to understand their ecology, their dispersal and distribution and the ‘quality of the ecosystem’ (Pollard. & Yates, 1993).

The Philippine butterfly species, like in various parts of the globe are not isolated from these changes and the fragmentation of their natural habitats will cause drastic decline in their population, wherein some will be forced to extinction

With that character and ecosystem requirement, they are also considered as important species for scientific research (Morris, Collins, Vane-Wright & Wange, 1991; Parsons, 1992).

Butterflies as scientific basis for biogeography and ecological studies

Butterflies are a suitable group for ecological studies; they are relatively large, conspicuous in comparison to other invertebrates, mostly diurnal, their taxonomy is relatively well known, and there are some data on their geographic distributions and for some species on their life history (Hill & Hamer, 1998; Spitzer, Jaros, Havelka & Leps, 1997).

According to Larsen (1993), butterfly communities are specific to ecological zones and as such less than one percent of them are ubiquitous. Most of them have their habitats restricted to the lowland forest zone, while the less specialized species thrive in agricultural lands and disturbed forest zones.

Butterflies have been used in population dynamics. They have yielded some of the most interesting results including the fact that local population are often not permanent but regularly go extinct followed by spontaneous re-introduction. Butterflies have been used in studying evolution of plants by co-evolution of insects. As such plants have evolved new and more toxic deterrents and butterfly larvae have become increasingly adopted at overcoming them. Butterflies have been found to be vital geographical and ecological indicators; they form communities which are specific to each of the geographical sub-regions and to different types of ecological conditions.

Thus, they have also been instrumental in the conservation of tropical forests, development and promotion of rural economies through ecotourism and butterfly farming (Young, 1986, BOSTID, 1983; Parsons, 1992).

Butterflies have been identified as important indicators of disturbances, habitats, and as surrogates for other taxa (Grill & Cleary, 2003).

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Most butterfly movement studies have focused on the abundance of larval food plants when patch quality was considered as a factor affecting movement (Schneider, Dover & Fry, 2003)

Further studies have shown that butterflies are a valuable resource in the lepidoptera trading industry (Parsons, 1992; Morris, Collins, Vane-Wright & Wange, 1991).

Butterflies as source of livelihood for rural communities

Economically, today butterflies are treated as valuable source of income among rural communities (Aguilar, 1993; Brinckerhoff & Sabido, 2000; Young, 1986, PCARRD, 2004). Aside from the fact that butterfly farming is endorsed by the Lepidoptera Specialists Group of the IUCN, it preserves the environment and butterfly species in the wild as well (BOSTID, 1983; Brinckerhoff & Sabido, 2000).

The foreign demand for dried butterfly specimens known as deadstock and lived pupae known as livestock and processed butterfly value-added products is continuously improving (Aguilar, 1993; Baltazar, 1991; BOSTID, 1983; DoST-IV, 1994; Labay, 2005; PAWB, 1993).

Today, the world’s leading producers of butterfly pupae are; Malaysia, Philippines, Thailand, Taiwan, Kenya, Madagascar, United States, El Salvador and Costa Rica (Brinckerhoff & Sabido, 2000; DoST-IV, 1994).

Butterflies as indicator of socio-cultural beliefs and practices

Rural folks have associated butterflies to the seasonal changes of nature and in their farming practices. Through years of interacting with butterflies in the wild, they have learned of using them as ‘messengers of nature’, that is they are relating the seasonal occurrences of certain species of butterflies in the wild to the right season of preparing the lands, the right season of planting their crops, as well as in predicting the flowering and fruiting of certain species of plants and the right season of predicting the emergence of pest in their locality. They learned about the interrelationships between the diverse butterfly species and plants and trees in the forest and the river by relating them to changes in seasons and weather in their locality (Labay, 2007).

Others believe that some species are serving as spirits of their love ones or spirits of the ‘unseen’ that need to be respected. Thus, in some areas of the forests and rivers where these species occur, are revered as sacred and need to be protected (Labay, 2007).

Butterflies as instrumental for ecotourism

In relation to the above, butterflies in the past five years have been instrumental in promoting ecotourism or ‘green tourism’ in the countryside (BOSTID, 1983; Brinckerhoff & Sabido, 2000; Morris, Collins, Vane-Wright & Wange, 1991; Mun & Weei, 2008; Young, 1986).

The protection of their natural habitats created a landscape that attracts tourists here and abroad, which further enhanced the creation of livelihood among rural communities.

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One clear example is the Municipality of Gasan that created a monthly celebration of Gasang- Gasang, where participants are wearing outfits fashioned from butterflies’ wings and the seasonal butterfly kite flying competition and ‘butterfly release activities’ in their natural habitats in a hope to replenish them in the wild.

The Butterflies of Marinduque

Systematics and Cladistics

Recent studies on the inventoried species of the province revealed 398 species (Table 2) belonging to six families, e.g. Hesperiidae (45), Lycaenidae (164), Nymphalidae (126), Papilionidae (31), Pieridae (30) and Riodinidae (2). They are represented by 23 subfamilies, 75 tribes and 121 genera (Labay, 2008)

Table 2. Taxonomical distribution of Marinduque’s butterflies* Superfamily Family Subfamily Tribe Genera Species Hesperioidea 1. Coeliadinae 1 2 7 (Skippers) Hesperiidae (45) 2. Hesperiinae 5 13 28 3. Pyrginae 2 5 10 1. Aphnaeinae 1 1 2 2. Curetinae 1 2 2 3. Lycaeninae 2 2 5 Lycaenidae (164) 4. Miletinae 2 4 14 5. Polyommatinae 2 1 60 6. Poritinae 1 2 5 Papilionoidea 7. 11 23 76 (True Butterflies) 1. Apaturinae 1 1 1 2. Charaxinae 2 3 5 3. Cyrestinae 1 1 3 4. Danainae 1 6 22 Nymphalidae (126) 5. Heliconiinae 2 7 12 6. Libytheinae 1 1 2 7. Limenitidinae 5 11 32 8. Nymphalinae 4 5 12 9. Satyrinae 5 14 37 Papilionidae (31) 1. Papilioninae 3 7 31 Pieridae (30) 1. Coliadinae 1 3 9 2. Pierinae 2 6 21 Riodinidae (2) 1. Riodininae 1 1 2 Hedyloidea none - - - - (Moth Butterflies) Total 23 57 121 398 *Taxonomical classification was synthesized from Lepidoptera Taxome Project (2004) & Tree of Life Web Project (2008).

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Table 3. Comparative number of butterflies species at national, regional and global level. Family World Oriental Region Philippines Marinduque Hesperiidae 4,073 570 253 45 Lycaenidae & Riodinidae 5,731 620 345 166 Nymphalidae 5,727 891 285 126 Papilionidae 565 170 56 31 Pieridae 1,020 160 59 30 Total 17,116* 2,411* 998** 398*** *Hoskins (1997) **de Jong & Treadaway (1993); Page & Treadaway (2003); Takami & Seki (2001); Treadaway (1995); Tsukada (1981, 1982, 1985, 1991); Schroëder. & Treadaway (2002) ***Labay (2008)

By comparing these numbers from the collated results of the published ‘scientifically known species’, where the country has about 998 species as shown in Table 3, the butterflies from the province comprise 39.88 percent that of the country, 16.51 percent that of the oriental region and 2.33 percent that of the world.

The Lycaenidae comprises two-fifths of the identified species, while the Nymphalidae comprises one-thirds of the total. Hesperiidae and Riodinidae are least represented in number as compared to the rest (Fig. 1).

Fig. 1. Distribution of butterfly species in Marinduque by family.

There is no clear study about butterfly endemism in the province. But, there are published papers on species and subspecies that are named after the province, such as Arophala anthelus marinduquensis Hayashi, Schröder & Treadaway and Dacalana monsapona marinduquensis Hayashi, Schröder & Treadaway and Paruparo lumawigi Schröder (Lycaenidae) and Euripus nyctelius marinduquanus Treadaway (Nymphalidae).

Other species that are considered endemic are Papilio palinurus daedalus C. Felder, Papilio luzviae Schröder & Treadaway, Pachliopta phlegon strandi Bryk and Pachliopta phlegon (annae) phlegon C&R Felder (Papilionidae).

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Habitat Distribution and Seasonality

The results of the study conducted from 1999 to 2008 in the so-called ‘Butterfly Ecological Zones’ of the province (Labay, 2008), 98.74 percent of the species could be found in Ilaya, Bagtingon-Mt. Natilus, Balagbag Mountain Range; 93.70 percent in Bayute-Kitay-Sabong Riparian Forest; 77.58 percent in Nabiling, Makawayan-Rhinoceros Horn, Mt. Malindig Area and 44.58 percent in Tugos-Banhigan-Duyay Area.

In terms of habitat type, more species were found in the dipterocarp forests—375 or 94.46%. It is followed by the riparian forests—371 or 93.45% and the swiddens and grasslands, 182 (45.84%) and 166 (41.81%) respectively. The mossy forest has 121 species (30.56%) while the cocal and built-in areas have 100 (25.19%) and 91 (22.92%) respectively.

The diverse species of butterflies in the riparian and dipterocarp forests can be related to the diversity of food plants in these areas. The mossy forest of Mt. Malindig, despite obscured by fog the whole year round also holds a number of species, but generally dominated by dark coloured satyrids, nymphalids and lycaenids.

The grasslands and swiddens also have good number of species, despite the limited number of host plants, because most of these areas are very closed to dipterocarp forests, like that of Bagtingon-Mt Natilus and Makawayan-Mt. Malindig

The prevalence of all species in a year was observed during the months of May until August. These maybe related to the seasonal regeneration and emergence of plants during these months, where the early rain of May triggers the plants to produce new leaves and flowers that serve as food plants.

Low population of species was observed in all areas in1999 as compared to 2002 and 2005. This maybe related to the swiddening activities of the local farmers in these areas and the carried- over effect of El Niño. As what Hammond said, the population of butterflies in the wild is not generally depending on the quality and diversity of food plants in a locality, but also dependent on minimum ‘seasonal weather variations’ (p.18).

The drastic increase in population in 2002 and 2005 maybe related to the regeneration of plants in the swiddens, especially in areas like Bagtingon-Mt. Natilus, Mt. Malindig, and Bayute- Kitay-Sabong, where swiddening was halted.

In 2001, the farmers left their swiddens for fallowing—that is leaving the land to regenerate its nutrients to make it productive again for agriculture. Thus, this fallowing made the former swiddens covered with food plants again—revegetating these areas with various host plants.

With these seasonal occurrences of species in their natural habitats, it can be presumed that most of them are ‘univoltine’, that is having ‘one brood per year’. Based from the observations I made in their natural habitat, majority of the species have one and a half to two months of metamorphosis change from ovum (egg) to imago (adult butterfly) and the adult has a general lifespan of three weeks to one month, depending on species type. The eggs that were laid in late February to early March emerged into imagines (adult butterflies) in May and would have

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