Profile
My name is Fujimidori, an insect photographer in Japan.
I have loved insects since I was a child, and I am particularly interested in butterflies, so I am constantly photographing them with my camera. I don’t get to go to the field very often due to my work schedule, but I do find time to travel around japan several times a year to look for butterflies and insects.
Background of launching this blog
My hobby is observing butterflies. I started observing butterflies around 2008.
In 2008, I happened to come across a ”Neozephyrus japonicus” at Shakujii Park in Tokyo, which was near where I lived at the time. I started observing and photographing butterflies with a compact digital camera.
Since then, I have expanded my field every year and increased the number of butterflies I observe, and now I have photographed approximately 200 types of butterflies in Japan.
The more you know about butterflies, the more fun it will be to observe them.
There are still many things we don’t know about, such as what butterflies camouflage, why swallowtail butterflies fly the same path, and why butterflies whose numbers are decreasing are decreasing. Learning through observation is fun.
This blog was created to help you understand the charm of these butterflies and the joy of learning about them.
I will try to convey the charm of butterflies as easily as possible, so please take a look.
Introducing the charms of butterflies
It is said that around 240 species of butterflies inhabit Japan. The reason why I wrote “around” is because there are several species of butterflies that temporarily fly in from overseas.
Including such butterflies that temporarily fly in from overseas, it is said that around 260 species of butterflies can be seen in Japan.
There are many butterflies that can only be observed in specific region, such as butterflies that live only in Hokkaido, butterflies that live only in Okinawa, butterflies that live only in Yakushima, and butterflies that live only in the Ogasawara Islands. Observing and photographing butterflies requires a huge amount of time and money, and is extremely difficult to complete even if it takes a lifetime.
Also, if we look at the ecology of individual butterflies, for example, a butterfly called the Niphanda fusca lives in the ant nest when it is a larva. There are several species of butterflies that coexist with ants.
Most butterfly larvae feed on plants, but the Taraka hamada are completely carnivorous and grow by eating aphids that attach to bamboo grass.
In this way, Japan is home to a wide variety of butterflies, and each species has its own ecology. The butterflies we see in our daily lives are only a small part of them.
The fun of looking for butterflies may be similar to the treasure hunt you had when you were a child.
It’s not useful in the real world, and you won’t make money unless you do it as a job, but I feel it’s a very good hobby.
In this blog I would like to introduce the charms of butterflies to everyone.