The Miraculous Mangosteen*

*With apologies to Bela Bartok

Six years ago, the New York Times ran a story on an exotic fruit called the mangosteen. The author waxed rhapsodic about the incredible taste of this Asian beauty that was unavailable in the US. I've craved one ever since. My recent trip to Malaysia represented my first opportunity to try them. At the risk of sounding like a 14-year-old girl, OMG, OMG, OMG!


Mangosteens are about the size of tennis balls. The outer skin has a very similar texture and toughness to that of a pomegranate. It's inedible- the delicious part lies hidden within. The blossom scar on the bottom is lobed, and the number of lobes corresponds to the number of segments of the inner fruit. Mangosteens are challenging to eat. The outer, inedible flesh is red, and it's juice stains. The inner fruit is very sticky and juicy, but the whole thing is so incredibly worthwhile that this hardy merits mentioning.


The segments of the inner fruit separate like those of a citrus, which is not even remotely related. The largest, (or occasionally two largest, as in this photo) segment contains a single seed, which is surrounded by a rich, fragrant and flavorful jelly. The smaller segments consist of the jellylike pulp with no seed.

I can't begin to describe the flavor. It's sweet and scented, though not cloying. There is no tartness like one might find in a kiwi, yet there's a bright, refreshing quality to the flavor. And, like the kiwi, it's tempting to describe the flavor as a combination of other fruits- yet in the end, it just tastes like mangosteen. I've waited six years to try this, and it lived up to expectations.


The other interesting fruit that I sampled on my trip was the rambutan, a relative of the lychee. The leathery skin is coated with pliable spines, that aren't at all sharp. The skin is easily ripped open with the fingers.


The white fruit within is about twice the size and the same texture as a peeled grape. There is a single seed within.


Rambutans are much easier to eat than mangosteens. Sweet and juicy, they are delicious in their own right, though they lack the startling complexity of flavor of the latter fruit.

Journey to the Cameron Highlands

The hosting institution for the ICBES conference in Malaysia was Tropical Entomological House. They maintain a beautiful butterfly display in Penang and supply live butterflies to other butterfly displays around the world, including ours. Earlier in the week , we had visited both their public display and their breeding facility. It looked lovely, even in the rain. Our hosts were, nonetheless, a bit disappointed that they had not able to show their facility at it's best due to the weather. They wanted us to return. As someone who runs a similar exhibit, I fully understood the motivation. Saturday morning was beautifully sunny, so we delayed our departure for the post-conference tour of the Cameron Highlands in order to have a better look at the exhibit.

I enjoyed the exhibit for a bit while waiting for my friend BT to show up. I had an ulterior motive. There is a nice population of tiger beetles on the grounds of the Butterfly Farm, and BT had told me I could collect a series. Let's just say that I had a very good time.

Spotted Tiger Beetle (Cicindela aurulenta)

This was the only species of tiger beetle that I would see on the trip, however I got to see it in several different locations. We departed the Farm for a journey to the mainland peninsula of Malaysia, with the plan of seeing some sites on the way to the Cameron Highlands. Penang is an island, and we departed via the longest bridge in Southeast Asia. It was a glorious day and we were treated to views of the islands dotting the Strait of Penang.

Island in the Strait of Penang

The road runs through an extensive region of oil palm plantations, then enters some beautiful tropical forest near the mountains. We skirted the coast and had lunch at a fishing village. The restaurant where we ate is the upstairs of a facility where fish is unloaded from the boats. Let's just say that the fish was very fresh. I especially enjoyed the pompano and the blood cockles.

Fishing docks viewed from the restaurant

Fisherman about to catch a line and tie his boat up

The fishing village was on a river estuary, surrounded by mangrove forests. There is a beautiful nature reserve with boardwalks though the mangroves. We visited after lunch. There was excellent wildlife viewing, including long-tailed macaques.

Mangrove Forest

Colorful Crab

Hairstreak
It's disconcerting to be as unfamiliar with the butterflies as I was here.

Long-tailed Macaque (Macaca fascicularis)

During the walk through the mangroves, I had a chat with Michael who was part of the hosting team. On the first day of the conference, as I was signing in, he approached me. Asking if I was Doug Taron, he told me that he was a reader of Gossamer Tapestry. Hi, Michael! As I was taking photographs, he asked if I planned to blog about this. I said or course, and had a colleague take a picture of the two of us so i could post it here.

Michael, Mangroves, and Me

While the mangroves forest seems idyllic, it is exploited as a resource. After lunch we stopped by a charcoal factory that used mangrove wood as a raw material. We were told that the mangrove is sustainably harvested. I have no way of assessing this myself. The boardwalk runs through secondary forest, the primary forest having long ago been cleared for charcoal. The charcoal factory was decidedly low tech, using human labor rather than machinery for most of the operation.

A worker shovels finished charcoal out of a kiln

By now it was late afternoon. It would take us several hours more to travel into the mountains where we would spend the next day. It was dark when we arrived and I fell asleep to the gentle tapping of tropical rain on the window.

World Travel Update

visited 22 countires (9.77%)

I suppose that since ;ve visited new countries, I should update my travel map. I may be cheating with China. I've only been to Hong Kong, and I never left the airport.



Create your own visited map of The World

Georgetown, Malaysia

Georgetown Street Scene

The ICBES conferences typically involve a mixture of meetings and touring the local area. On the second day of the Malaysian conference, we visited Georgetown, a moderately big city on the island of Penang. Georgetown is named for King George, who was the British monarch at the time the British established their first Malaysian colony on the island of Penang. Fort Cornwalis was constructed to defend the colony.


We toured the religious district and compared architecture of the various churches, mosques, and temples. One Chinese temple was particularly impressive.


In spite of being in a densely populated city, we were able to observe some nice insect life on our tour.

One of the many Blues that I saw on this trip
Update : Plains Cupid (Chilades pandava)

Dragonfly I loved that fact that we saw a dragon in the Chinese temple
Update: Green Skimmer (Orthetrum sabina)

After our brief tour of the city, we were driven to the outskirts of town to ride a funicular train to the top of Penang Hill. This part reminded me of the gondola ride that ICBES participants took up the mountain outside of Quito two years ago.

Funicular

There was lots of wildlife to see from the top of the hill, including my first glimpse of a birdwing butterfly in the wild (no photo- it was really just a glimpse.

I apologize for the bad quality of the bird photo. The green fruit pigeon was the coolest bird that I saw on Penang Hill. It was skittish and moved around a lot. There are many species of green fruit pigeons. This one is a pink-necked green pigeon (Treron vernans) Emerald Dove (Chalcophaps indica).

Pink-necked Green Pigeon (Treron vernans)
Emerald Dove (Chalcophaps indica).

The late afternoon sun on the city of Georgetown was a memorable close to the day.

Update: Thanks much to Amila for help with species identifications.

Dispatch From the Spice Islands

I’ve been in Penang for a little less than 36 hours. I’m here for ICBES, the International Congress of Butterfly Exhibitors and Suppliers.

It has been an exciting visit so far. Above is the view from my hotel room. Most of yesterday until mid-afternoon was taken up with various meetings related tot he butterfly display industry. I sneaked out for a few minutes at lunch and walked across the street to the beach. My first-ever view of the Indian Ocean was not terribly inspiring (from our location, you see mostly a blank expanse of sea) but I got a few photos of shorebirds on rocks. Nancy’s field guide to birds of southeast Asia says that this one is a common sandpiper. On the way back in to the meeting, I photographed a huge metallic bee. This species makes the huge carpenter bees that I see around Tucson look like sweat bees.

Common Sandpiper

Big-ass Bee

Just how packed our time is going to be was hinted at by the fact that we did not start doing anything outside the meeting room until nearly 3 in the afternoon. We bundled up into a couple of buses and headed up the road to a spice farm. It was interesting to see the nutmeg and clove trees, but much more interesting was the diverse insect life that we began to encounter almost immediately. There is a stream running through the spice farm, and there were dragonflies everywhere.

A couple of the colorful dragonflies from the spice farm

There were some fascinating grasshoppers.

Another bird grasshopper (Schistocerca)
Similar to what I saw in Florida, only bigger and more colorful

I love the tropics!!!

I could have stayed longer, but the group was loaded back on the bus to visit a batik factory. Then we visited the butterfly farm that is hosting this year’s conference. We saw both the public display area and the area devoted to butterfly production. The host farm is one of our suppliers of butterflies, so it was pleasant to be able to see the facility.

Breeding Room at the Tropical Entomological House (TEH) Butterfly Farm


Lacewing Butterfly (Cethosia) at the TEH butterfly exhibit


Lacewing Butterfly Larvae at the TEH Butterfly Farm

Dinner was at a seafood restaurant that featured a floor show of regional dance. Between the jet lag and a late night I’m pretty shot right now- yet later this afternoon brings the promise of more of Malaysia’s natural beauty. First, it’s downstairs for some more meetings.

Semi-traditional dance (the music was Bollywood soundtrack)

IBCM

Caution: If you are UrSpo, you may want to exercise caution when scrolling through this post. Other arachnophobes may also wish to exercise caution.

IBCM Participants at the University of Florida Natural Area

Greetings from the departure lounge at JFL International Airport. I'm awaiting my flight to Hong Kong and on to Malaysia. I have no idea what Internet access will be like from my Hotel in Penang. I plan to take lots of photos, and look forward to blogging about my trip.

I'm just back from the second installment of IBCM, the Imperiled Butterfly Conservation and Management Workshop. The first installment was last July at the Toledo Zoo. This week we were in Gainesville, Florida at The McGuire Center for Lepidoptera and Biodiversity. In addition to lots of lectures and demonstrations, we were treated to a tour of the Center and some visits to local natural areas.

Compactor Shelving at the McGuire Center
Each tray is full of pinned butterflies and moths


A tray full of pinned Arctiid moths


Dr. Tom Emmel shows the group a mounted series of Xerces Blues (Glaucopsyche xerces) This speces has been extinct since about 1940

We had several opportunities to visit the McGuire Center's Butterfly Rainforest.

Anartia sp.


The Clipper (Parthenos sylvia)
I hope to see this species in the wild in Malaysia

The workshop included visits to the University of Florida's natural area, and Morningside Nature Center in Gainesville. Both of these are restored Longleaf Pne habitats. I felt a bit like cedrorum as I visited the siets. Neither is home to Red-cockeaded Woodpeckers, but they were both lovely natural areas.

UF Natural Area
The wooded section in the background has not been burned.


Our host Jaret at the Morningside Nature Center

I got a few invertebrate photos at Morningside

Road to Nowhere

State Highway 361 in Dixie County, Florida is a cool place. It was built decades ago at the behest of corrupt state officials as a landing strip for small airplanes running drugs into this country. It's our in the middle of nowhere along the Gulf Coast. The road runs for about 6 miles through scrub and sand, ending in a huge salt marsh. Apparently it's no longer much used for drug running, something I kept reminding myself as I went out there blacklighting late Sunday night. I did feel somewhat vulnerable by myself in such an isolated spot late at night. I also didn't get anything in to the sheet.

S-banded Tiger Beetle (Cicindela trifasciata)

A whole bunch of species of tiger beetles can be found in this spot. Unfortunately, it's too late in the season for most species. Still, I got some nice photos of the S-banded Tiger Beetle (Cicindela trifasciata) when I went back on Monday. It was interesting getting to see this somewhat notorious collecting spot.