BUTTERFLY FARMING IN ZANZIBAR

At the Zanzibar Butterfly Center, visitors get to experience the first moments of a butterfly's life,
while the Center provides an income for local farmers and incentives them to protect the tropical forest.

While traveling and volunteering, we often meet or hear about creative people doing innovative things to help alleviate poverty. Until a recent visit to the Zanzibar Butterfly Center, however, we had never imagined farming butterflies as an engine to support local economies.

Figo the butterfly farmer

But just ask Figo, one of the more than 30 villagers who raise caterpillars for the Center in the island's tropical forests. The young entrepreneur filled us in on the practice's viability.

"It gives us a reliable source of income," says Figo, who lives near the Center and became a butterfly farmer three years ago. "It also gives us a reason not to cut down the forests, which we used to use for charcoal."

Farmers like Figo can earn a steady income, selling their "crops" either locally to the Butterfly Center, which needs a constant supply, or for export to markets as far away as Europe. 

Depending on the species of butterfly the pupa will produce, farmers can earn anywhere from 25 cents to one dollar per pupa, also called a chrysalis. Since most butterflies live only 2-3 weeks, the work and resulting income is steady, as long as there is demand.

Liz peers into the raising cage, where mature pupae are glued to sticks. There, they will eventually emerge as butterflies, which you can witness during your visit to the Zanzibar Butterfly Center.

Founded six years ago by a Scottish ecologist, a Zanzibari forester and a Tanzanian conservationist, the Center received a United Nations SEED grant last year, recognizing it for sustainable development and environmental innovation. 

"Visitors can see and touch all stages of the life cycle, from egg to caterpillar to pupa to new-born butterfly," said co-founder and Scotsman, Benjamin Hayes. "It's one of the biggest butterfly facilities in Africa, and every visit helps us support the local farmers."

The glistening green chrysalis of the Gold-banded Forester is dotted with gold flakes.

If you get to Zanzibar, make sure you drop by the Center for a visit. Enjoy the surroundings, learn about the insects' life cycles, and best of all, try to stand still while watching a newborn butterfly take its first flight from the palm of your hand. 

Best of all, remember you're visit and dollars help support the livelihood of some of Africa's only butterfly farmers. 

ZBC founder Benjamin Hayes (left) and a volunteer show off a collection of pupae. 

An African Monarch, also called a Plain Tiger, rests on a leaf at the Zanzibar Butterfly Center.

PHOTO FRIDAY: BUTTERFLY AND MARIGOLDS

A Painted Lady drinks her breakfast in Nepal's Annapurna Sanctuary.

The steep, stony trails of Nepal's Annapurna Sanctuary are lined with countless patches of flowers. Some grow wild, while others decorate the narrow yards of the people who live there. All the bursting blooms attract swarms of butterflies, as we saw one morning at breakfast. 

Above, an adult Painted Lady drinks her morning meal. Nearby, we sipped locally-brewed tea with yak milk and enjoyed the view. 

After Everest, we thought hiking again anytime soon was out of the question. Days later we're trekking in Annapurna. Such is life.

WORLD'S LARGEST visitable CAVE

Kip a half mile deep in Deer Cave in Mulu National Park. 

Borneo is a land of extremes--towering, jagged limestone peaks, some of the most lethal plants and animals alive, not to mention the island's history of cannibalism, which may or may not have ended as recently as the 1990s, depending on who you talk to.

Another extreme here--caves. Carved from porous limestone underneath acres and acres of dense jungle lives one of the world's largest cave systems. Among all that empty underground space sits the Earth's largest cave, or at least what used to be called that.

Until recently, Gunung Mulu World Heritage Area in the north central part of the island boasted that its Deer Cave was the planet's biggest. However, explorers recently uncovered a larger one in Vietnam...but since no one is allowed to visit the "new" one yet, we'll bask in the glory of our visit to one unbelievably massive hole in the ground.

Mulu, as folks call it here, is an isolated area unreachable by road. Visitors either travel by foot and boat for three days along the "Headhunter Trail" (yes, headhunting parties used this path) or they can fly in on a small propeller plane where you practically sit with the pilot, which is the option we went with due to time constraints.

Grabbing our packs at the Mulu airport baggage claim, we were greeted by a man holding a sign with Liz's name on it. This was a first for the trip. Since lodging is limited around the park, we had booked ahead to be sure we had a room to sleep in, but we didn't expect this kind of service, even if the place was called the Mulu River Lodge. Reality set in quickly, however.

After a short, dusty ride with our bags in the back of a 4x4 pickup, we arrived at the "lodge," only to find that our reservation at what sounded like a really nice jungle hotel was actually for three nights in two single beds in a dorm with 25 of our new closest friends. Regretfully, we have no photo of this room, but the beds were close enough for your neighbor's breath to fog up your eyelids, and the scent of all the hiking boots and sweaty clothes could torch nose hairs.

While the sleeping arrangements were lacking, the beauty of our one-room hotel was its location--just 50 feet away was a rickety wood and cable suspension bridge that led across a rushing river to Mulu's entrance.

Kip was also excited because the place was surrounded by countless species of Borneo's colorful butterflies, including Brooke's Birdwing, one of the world's largest (photo at left), which flew past our breakfast table every morning we were there.
In the days that followed, we crisscrossed the nearby bridge morning and night checking out the park's highlights, which included the aforementioned Deer Cave, Langs Cave, miles of nature trails, waterfalls, morning treks, night hikes, and our favorite, the park's world famous "Bat Exodus," which features some three million bats soaring from Deer Cave every evening to start their nightly hunt.

From lethal animals to massive caves to smelly dorms, the land of extremes delivered all we could imagine and then some. It's going to be hard to leave this place.

Liz explores Langs Cave in Mulu National Park. 

Caving with Abe Lincoln?

The bat exodus begins. 

That's one big tree.

Doing the "Sky Walk" canopy tour.

Another species of the deadly Bornean Pit Viper we saw on a walk through the park.