Mosaics

 

GBE took this photo of a beetle in New Zealand this week and we have been trying to identify it – so far without success.


While doing so I came across this rather super mosaic by Jacqui Castle of a Goliath Beetle wandering. For more mosaics see various pages of the Mosaic Association of Australia and New Zealand.


While on the subject of GB’s wildlife he also found a Northern Wattle Moth (Dasypodia cymatodes) in his living room. This moth was known to early Maori who found the odd moth blown in from Australia before the first wattle trees were planted in NZ, hence the Maori names: pepe kehue, pepe atua, para kori taua, all of which refer to the belief that these mysterious moths were the returning spirits of ancestors. (A similar belief about noctuid moths is found in Madagascar.) Also known as owl, moon or peacoock moth from the ‘eye’ pattern on the wings, shining like a new moon or like the tail feathers of a peacoock.