Passion for butterflies emerges from cocoons
Decadelong efforts produce expansive handbook on over 2,100 species across China
Childhood hobby
Sun's journey with butterflies began with anticipation. His father, raised in the countryside in Shandong province, often took him outdoors. Back then, Shandong springs were colder, and butterflies wouldn't appear until after Jingzhe, or the Awakening of Insects, observed on the third of the 24 solar terms in the traditional Chinese calendar. Each spring, he'd eagerly await their return.
With the advent of home computers, the internet unveiled a completely different world of butterflies. Chen Xichang, an enthusiast in Guangzhou, Guangdong province, created a butterfly website, uploading scanned photographs of butterflies found in southern China. Dial-up internet was agonizingly slow, Sun said. A photo would gradually appear on the screen over several minutes. The butterflies in these photos had colors and patterns unlike those Sun had observed in the north.
"To me then, they seemed to come from another world," Sun told China Daily. He was fascinated.
He later learned that Chen and earlier enthusiasts in Guangzhou, during an era of taking photos with expensive film, had preserved invaluable ecological records. Some butterflies in those old photos are now rarely seen in their original habitats. The photos that once kept him waiting patiently in front of the computer have slowly become evidence of lives once lived.
His father initially bought him a 5-megapixel Sony compact digital camera. The quality seemed excellent then, but the short focal length demanded getting very close without startling butterflies.
In high school, his father gifted him a digital single-lens reflex camera with an 18-55 millimeter lens. "I thought a DSLR would guarantee great butterfly photos," he said. But a summer trip to Yuntai Mountain in Henan province proved otherwise. "Even with a better camera, the butterflies didn't linger longer," he said.
However, the camera ignited a strong desire. "I wanted to know what these butterflies I was photographing were called, how to distinguish them, and where they lived," he added. This led him to read, research and connect with fellow enthusiasts. Gradually, a hobby turned into a passion and then an obsession.
