A collector of more than 4.2 million African butterflies wants to share them with the future

NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) – What started as a childhood hobby more than six decades ago has led to what may be Africa’s largest butterfly collection in a suburb of Kenya’s capital.

Steve Collins, 74, was born and raised in western Kenya. At the age of 5, he became fascinated with butterflies and began to build a collection that has grown to more than 4.2 million, representing hundreds of species.

Collins says: “My parents encouraged us to look for butterflies after visiting the Congo and some of my friends were given a trap net.” When I was 15 years old, I traveled to other countries like Nigeria to learn more about butterflies. .”

During his 20-year career as an agronomist, Collins devoted his free time to research. He founded the African Butterfly Research Institute in 1997.

Now, running out of space and time, he hopes to pass it on to the next generation.

On his 1.5 hectare (0.6 hectare) land, hundreds of native trees and flowering trees form a well-kept forest. Hundreds of butterflies danced from flower to flower, sometimes landing on Collins’ hand.

His collection is private, although it was initially open to the public when he ran it as an academic institution between 1998 and 2003.

Collins has 1.2 million butterflies from all over Africa neatly pinned in frames and stored on rows of shelves, and another 3 million in envelopes.

“They need to be kept in dark places,” he said. “The latter method ensures that the dried butterflies are not eaten by other insects, parasites and predators. We also ensure that we apply pesticides once a year to keep them safe.”

Julian Bayliss, a naturalist who works in Africa and is a visiting professor at Oxford Brookes University, said that Collins has been collecting butterflies for two decades.

“There is a large part of that collection that cannot be completely removed because a large part of Africa’s land is being destroyed,” said Bayliss.

Africa is vulnerable to climate change, with periods of prolonged drought and severe floods destroying forests and other butterfly habitats.

Bayliss suggested digitizing the collection to make it universally accessible.

Whoever takes it “must be a well-founded, well-funded and secure institution,” he said.

Scott Miller, an entomologist at the Smithsonian Institution, met Collins about 30 years ago. He said such collections provide critical information that can show environmental changes in 60 years.

“These physical examples, you can keep coming back to them for new layers of knowledge as you learn more or you get different skills or you get different questions,” he said.

Collins is worried that he will soon be unable to continue his research. He said his most expensive butterfly is worth $8,000 – he doesn’t see it, worried it could be stolen – and he hopes to sell the collection to an individual or a research institute.

The cost of running his institution is high. The annual budget listed in 2009 on the Lepidopterists’ Society of Africa website was $200,000.

Collins estimates that the specimens and other goods are worth $8 million.

“This has been my hobby for decades, and I cannot put a price on what I have done so far. Right now I am trying to make sure that these animals are in safe hands when I am gone,” he said.

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Associated Press reporter Khaled Kazziha in Nairobi, Kenya, contributed to this report.