It's one of the Sabethes species found in central and South America.
What a shame this particular specimen also happens to be an important carrier of tropical disease.
The picture was taken by Gil Wizen from Ontario, Canada. His work is highly commended in this year's Wildlife Photographer of the Year competition.
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Wildlife photographer Rahul Singh has managed to a lot of amazing shots with a wide range of different animal species. These include elephants, deer, jackals, monkeys and rhinos. As beautiful as these may be, his real passion is capturing photos of colorful birds he can find nesting in his home city. This is the moment that left him stunned.
"I visited a place where there were bushes of these ornamental bananas to take photos of sunbirds sucking nectar from it." "Everything was going as usual when, suddenly, I was shocked that the crimson sunbird started taking a bath in the water stored in the banana flower petal." The red petaled flower in these photos is called the banana flower, and it collected water from the early morning drizzle in one of its petals.
The tiny crimson sunbird, which only stretches to 4 inches long made the most of the opportunity to cool down on a hot day. After filling up on nectar, the mini songbird cooled down in the petal 'bathtub'. This was a once in a lifetime moment for Rahul, in all his years of bird watching, he had never seen anything like it.
"I was literally stunned to see this unusual behavior, I kept my camera's shutter button pressed as the bird took her bath." Rahul then posted the photos onto his Instagram. He was clearly ecstatic to have been at the right place at the right time to capture this magical moment. "This was really a once-in-a-lifetime moment," said Rahul. "It's amazing how nature can surprise us." Images credit: instagram.com/rahulsinghclicks
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Well, if there’s anything special about them, when they are not buzzing about in the air, it’s the incredible patterns on their wings. There are over 160,000 species of moths in the world, many of which are yet to be identified. The patterns and colors on their wings are formed by thousands of tiny scales, overlapping like tiles on a roof. [1] When they lie still long enough to be observed, especially among the larger species, you’d often be blown away at how artistic Mother Nature truly is. She’s unrivaled, and thanks to wildlife photographers, we get to see all her creative pieces and designs, one species at a time.
Tiger-eye motif
The Brahmaea hearseyi is one such species of moths that got the best of Mother Nature’s wing designs. Also known as the tiger-eye moth, these moths come from the Brahmin family and are one of its largest species. They are particularly identified by the well-developed eyespots on their front wings and a series of black-brown stripes, often giving the striking impression of a tiger’s eye. The species are found in many places such around Asia such as Northeastern Himalaya, Burma, Western China, Sundaland, and the Philippines.
The moths are diurnal and can only be active during the day. At night, they spread out their large wings (which often have a span of 160–200mm) on the barks of trees and on rocks to rest. They are so inactive at night that when they are disturbed, they cannot fly away to safety. They only shake vigorously to ward off the predator but would remain in their spots. They are found mostly in tropical and temperate forests.
The incredible footage below was captured by wildlife photographer, David Weiller, who visited Borneo in Malaysia for an expedition. Speaking to Bored Panda, Weiller explained that the moth was just recently hatched when he came across it.
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