Night Walk At Venus Drive (16 Oct 2015)

I was away for a short holiday last week in Genting Highlands, Malaysia. It was a good respite from the haze in Singapore. Although the haze did reached Genting Highlands, fortunately it dissipated on the third day that I was there and I was able to enjoy a few days of cool and fresh highlands air.

While I was there, I did some beetle hunting under some bright street lights. Here are some bonus photographs of the interesting beetles that I found there. Do pardon the quality of the photographs as they were taken using my mobile phone. These beetles reminded me of why I started this blog years ago. There is no comparison in terms of sizes of the beetles in the highlands to that of Singapore.

This was one the big beetles that I found, albeit that this was a road-kill (noticed the tiny ants that were on it). Sadly there were many of such finding. This is something that a beetle lover would not want to see.

After almost a week of haze free air in the highlands, it took a while to get use to the haze in Singapore, even though the haze situation in Singapore has improved a lot more. My friend contacted me for a night macro photography session and we decided to go to Venus Drive, given the dry weather caused by the haze. It didn't rained for a week and so we were expecting a much lower chance of finding beetles (even for Venus Drive).

On this trip, I was testing out a new DIY diffuser but I was not satisfied with the results of the test. Nevertheless the photographs were included in this post as a record of the trip. Here's a photograph of the few tarantulas that we encountered during the trip.

The first beetle for the trip was a commonly encountered Chafer Beetle (Apogonia expeditionis).

Near to the Apogonia expidtionis Chafer Beetle was another Chafer Beetle (Adoretus compressus).

Further down was a large Elephant Ear Plant and on it was a Ant-like Flower Beetle (Anthelephila cyanea).

There were many woodpiles at the place and on one one of the piles was this small 2 mm Darkling Beetle.

On the side of another log nearby was a Fungus Weevil (Eucorynus crassicornis).

Resting on a leaf was a small 8 mm Long Horned Beetle (Eopors elegans).

On a Singapore Rhododendron plant (Melastoma malabathricum) was a lone Leaf Beetle (Argopus brevis).

Resting on the underside of a rotten log was a 12 mm Darkling Beetle. This type of beetle can often be seen on rotting logs.

Hiding in a small crevice of a fallen tree was a lovely Darkling Beetle (Androsus fasciolatus).

The weather was rather dry and hence the number of beetles encountered was not very high. Here's a tiny 2 mm beetle encountered after a while of walking.

On a woodpile at the side of the trail was a pair of Darkling Beetles (Ceropria induta) on a dried up white bracket fungus.

Further down the path was a black Ground Beetle resting on a Fishtail Palm.

Scurrying among the leaf litters was a Darkling Beetle which proved to be a challenge in getting a decent photograph.

On a small tree nearby was a small 5 mm Fungus Weevil.

On the same tree was a roundish 5 mm Darkling Beetle.

After walking for another while without finding any beetle, I was glad when my friend called out to me to photograph this Fungus Beetle (Eumorphus quadriguttatus quadriguttatus) resting on a leaf.

Further down the trail was a woodpile where this small 4 mm Ground Beetle (Minuthodes multisetosa) was running about.

Near to the woodpile was a fallen log with the only "fresh" fungus mushroom found for the trip. On the fungus mushroom were several Sap Beetles.

A stone's throw away was another Ground Beetle (Onypterygia longispinis) resting on a leaf. The beetle was so alert that it promptly flew off after one photograph shot.

Near to the Ground Beetle was a patch of Clidemia hirta plant and on it were several of this metallic bronze colored Chafer Beetle.

On a tree near to the Chafer Beetle was a fallen tree where several of these beetle larvae where on it.

It was about time that we turn back and call it a day, just then we encountered a Tiger Beetle (Cicindela aurulenta) resting on a leaf by the side of the trail.

Near to the Tiger Beetle was a Darkling Beetle (Strongylium tenuipes) resting motionlessly on a tree.

The last beetle for the night was a Long Horned Beetle (Epepeotes luscus).

Although my DIY diffuser did not performed as well as I expected, the trip was still a fruitful one since the number of beetles encountered was still reasonably good.