Birdwing butterfly

This butterfly is commonly known as Raja Brooke, named after the British Raja of Sarawak.

The creature has very long pointed wings with feathery appearance. The black color appears velvety while the green is a brilliant metallic green. The beauty of this butterfly comes from this green hue organized in one continuos row of triangular shaped ‘feathers’.

The male has a vivid crimson collar around the neck and couple more on the fore body. There are also some white touches on the outer margin of the hind wings.

The female is marginally larger than the usual 6.25 inches wingspan and can easily identified by the white splashes in the forewings, which is even more significant in flight. The overall colors are comparatively less brilliant than those on the male.

The species shown here is the albescens which we encountered in Selangor and these butterflies are native of the 3 middle states of Perak, Selangor, and Pahang. Further south in the wetlands of Johore and along the swampy stretches of peninsular eastern coast, they are the mollumar. Further east towards Borneo and the Indonesian Islands the Trogonoptera brookiana trogon roam free.

Back in the territories of the albescens, the male are hovering around the vicinities parallel to the banks of forest streams in the low to moderate elevations. It is also quite common for them to settle in-group of over a dozen butterflies congregating at moist patches which contain traces on mineral salts, such as Hot Springs, leftover stains of food by picnickers and urinated spots.

The female practices a different habit, they prefer to stay at higher grounds 750-3,500 feet and they are also flying higher, near treetops, at least 20-40 feet above the ground.