Many of us rely on wildlife photographers to remain in contact with the most unusual and uncommon species on the planet. We wouldn’t even know what certain creatures look like without them. Consider the rare and endangered Philippine eagles and white-bellied pangolins, both of which have been photographed long before they become extinct. David Weiller, a photographer who investigates nature’s wonders, recently revealed to us another rarely seen animal—the Brahmaea hearseyi moth.
Weiller, who resides in France, told Bored Panda that he began photographing animals as a pastime in 2008 when he travelled to Africa with his buddy and wildlife photographer Thomas Marant, who was photographing primates for his book (“Like Us: Encounters with Primates”).
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The Northeast Himalayas, Western China, Sundaland, Burma, and the Philippines are all home to the species. Weiller came upon the strange moth in one of these locations, Sabah, Borneo. “This was a serendipitous find since it was drawn to the light of my jungle hut at night. I was astounded to see it, freshly hatched and with such stunning markings. “After circling the light for a bit, it landed for the night on a nearby tree trunk,” he explained. The photographer captured magnificent HD footage of the moth’s markings as it was sitting comfortably on a branch.
“Some photographs take maybe 1 day or 1 week to acquire, this was a simple shot, moths are pretty easy to take pictures of in the cold hours of the early morning as they are not yet warm enough to fly away and stay quite still,” Wriller said. It was still sitting calmly in the same location the next morning at daybreak. I put up my tripod, camera, and macro lens and began taking photos and movies of it progressively warming up by flapping its wings. The sun rose a few minutes later and went away into the beautiful sky.”
This moth is a member of the Brahmin moth family, commonly known as the Brahmaeidae. Their family is made up of seven different genera and almost 40 different moth species.
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All of these species are distinguished by their exquisite wing designs, which attract everyone who sees them.
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Brahmaea hearseyi is perhaps the strangest member of its family since its brown-colored wings might be mistaken for tiger eyes.
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