Leptosia nina
In 3 days ~20% in a week ~50%
Leptosia nina, the psyche, is a small butterfly of the family Pieridae (the sulphurs, yellows and whites) and is found in Indian subcontinent, southeast Asia and Australia. The upper forewing has a black spot on a mainly white background. The flight is weak and erratic and the body of the butterfly bobs up and down as it beats its wings. They fly low over the grass and the butterfly rarely leaves the ground level.
From Charles Thomas Bingham's The Fauna of British India, Including Ceylon and Burma. Butterflies. Vol 2. (1907) Unpublished manuscript of Lionel de Nicéville gives it the common name of "wandering snowflake" Upperside: white; base of wings very slightly powdered with minute black scales. Forewing: costa speckled obscurely with black; apex black, the inner margin of this inwardly angulate; a very large somewhat pear-shaped post-discal spot also black. Hindwing white, uniform; in most specimens an obscure, extremely slender, terminal black line.
Underside: white; costal margin and apex of forewing broadly, and the whole surface of the hindwing irrorated (speckled) with transverse, very slender, greenish strigae and minute dots; these on the hindwing have... Wikipedia →
| # | Park | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Namdapha National Park | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 2 | Cat Tien National Park | 🇻🇳 Vietnam | |
| 3 | Gunung Leuser National Park | 🇮🇩 Indonesia | |
| 4 | Taman Negara National Park | 🇲🇾 Malaysia | |
| 5 | Minneriya National Park | 🇱🇰 Sri Lanka | |
| 6 | Kinabalu Park | 🇲🇾 Malaysia | |
| 7 | Kaeng Krachan National Park | 🇹🇭 Thailand |
| # | City | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Guwahati | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 2 | Yogyakarta | 🇮🇩 Indonesia | |
| 3 | Jamshedpur | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 4 | Thiruvananthapuram | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 5 | Jabalpur | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 6 | Tasikmalaya | 🇮🇩 Indonesia | |
| 7 | Dhaka | 🇧🇩 Bangladesh | |
| 8 | Bhubaneshwar | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 9 | Kozhikode | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 10 | Manila | 🇵🇭 Philippines |
With luck
About 10% of wildlife watchers report a Psyche sighting in Kuala Lumpur on a given day, based on 23 verified sightings from GBIF citizen-science data. It is the 85th most-seen of the 323 insects we can rate there. Over three days the chance rises to about 20%, and over a week to about 50%, if each day is a fresh chance.
July–October and December–May
In those months about 10% of wildlife watchers report a Psyche in Kuala Lumpur on a given day, against under 5% in June and November, the lowest months.
Between 8 and 11 am
Across all the parks we cover, that three-hour window holds the most Psyche sightings with a recorded time, and about 8 in 10 of them come between 6 am and 6 pm: it is a daytime animal.
34th of 38
Of the 38 cities where we can rate Psyche sightings, Kuala Lumpur ranks 34th at about 10%. The best odds are in Guwahati (India, about 40%), Yogyakarta (Indonesia, about 40%) and Jamshedpur (India, about 40%).
Same family: Pieridae
The closest relatives of the Psyche that you can see in Kuala Lumpur (family Pieridae, Whites, Yellows, and Sulphurs) are Western Striped Albatross (about 20%), Painted Jezebel (about 10%) and Chocolate Albatross (about 10%), with each one's daily chance of a sighting.
GBIF citizen-science records
It is estimated from how often the Psyche is recorded against all the insects logged in Kuala Lumpur (23 verified sightings), calibrated against known sighting rates. Figures are rounded to the nearest 10% because citizen-science data supports honest approximations, not decimals, and months with records from fewer than five people show "—". How it works.
