With the exception of the occasional, capricious squeak from a babbler, no bird calls can be heard. The sun ­towers above the dense scrub, its carefully directed rays appearing to have contracted jaundice. To the late risers of the natural world, this unsounded alarm is as audible as an orchestra of ­cicadas in the monsoon. Having carefully selected the leafless tree of his choice, a young Calotes lizard positions himself onto it, his limbs in a sort of spreadeagle – a ritualistic affair. Presently, a rather large Black Rajah lands on an adjacent branch. The lizard quickly shifts his attention to this food item… a little too ­noticeably, perhaps. The butterfly immediately relocates to ­another branch – a higher one that is out of the reptile’s reach. As the dejected garden lizard trudges back to his tanning bed, he notices something – the thing that had drawn the insect to the stumpy tree in the first place. Never mind. That was only one of them, he assures himself, the main course won’t be long now.

Now, I’ve been particularly fortunate in actually knowing the lizard in question – quite well actually. What I’ve described is a standard scenario. Pretty much the same thing happens every day, and yet there will always be variation… which is what got me hooked for almost a year. I would never miss the eight-thirty show, for, not only would the lizard’s order arrive, it would turn up in the twentieth or thirtieth helping, continuing to replenish itself.

So how on earth did the tree manage to pull this off? How was this even possible?

The Black Rajah’s peculiar taste in seating furniture was not driven by mere temerity. He was, in fact, here to indulge in an all- you-can-eat-buffet of his own; one that (a closer inspection revealed) served up a rich and balanced menu of sap, sap, and …you guessed it…. more sap. The diners were far from bored by the variety, though. To say that the Rajahs lived to eat is saying much too little. High customer satisfaction didn’t keep them coming back for more, it just kept them; an individual who began working on the tree’s exudations one particular morning would, with remarkable predictability, go on for the rest of the day, and perhaps next day or two as well, sometimes even ending his short existence that way. The reason behind this ceaseless excavation of the tree’s vascular fluids is still unclear to me – the species has been reported to consume nectar, and yet I’ve never seen Rajahs anywhere else but near the generous tree. It would seem (at least in this curious case) that their entire adult lives revolved around this nutrient-rich fermenting sap. As a health food, nectar probably pales in comparison.

I owe the tree big time; it isn’t only the Black Rajah that it introduced me to; but for its gaping wounds, I would never have formed the buzzing, swarming acquaintances that I did. These were a diverse lot, unified by nothing more than a crazy, unquenchable thirst for sap, a craving marked by a very unusual, um, imperativeness, if you will. There are, for example, butterflies (some of the Blues, and most Nymphalidae) that just can’t seem to get enough of the rich liquid, and then there are those, Swallowtails, yellows and skippers included, that, well, can – species that wouldn’t set wing within a mile radius of the plant juices even in a million years of evolution – the only difference between the two being that any other substance these were bound to consume would inevitably be taken for granted, and treated with, to speak comparatively, plain indifference. How often do you come across, say, a Swallowtail or a Yellow drinking from a flower like it would ill-befit the world grievously if it were to stop feeding? Well, you wouldn’t, but with a species that’s taken a fancy to tree sap, it’s pretty much drink or die. I strongly believe that fermented sap will prove to be the most popular alcoholic drink in the future of mankind; its soporific (or ‘sap’orific, should I say) effects on the Rhopalocera speak for themselves.

A Black Rajah orgy

The standard fare: a butterfly’s original interaction with the liquid would usually be met with excessive, frantic, excited flapping. But come a few more minutes of this elation, and intoxication would begin to set in. It wouldn’t be uncommon to find, on a secluded corner of the tree, a subdued specimen ­struggling to maintain his balance, clearly hammered beyond relief.

Ownership over this munificent tree of providence was, at all times, vagrant and unpredictable. If I were to have randomly walked up to the tree one day, I might’ve come upon a large concentration of Common Castors. The Black Rajahs would’ve been there too, of course – they were permanent fixtures – but not too many other insects of the scaly-winged kind. Now suppose that I were to make another visit to the tree a week later, heck, no, a day later, I would have probably found the Black Rajah, yes, but also a new bunch of colonisers, say, the Common Sailor or the Indian Sunbeam, but most remarkably, no Castors at all.

Competition for the tree’s precious resource would customarily be raw and ruthless. The manner in which territory could be gained or lost here is reminiscent of one of the late Age of Empires video games, offering an explanation for the unusual fervour with which most customers would dine. Not the Rajah, though. Charaxes’s killer attitude more than compensated for a timid and frail appearance. In a way, the species was the landlord of the sap patches – the corrupt, lazy type that is usually too flushed with its own success to care enough about anyone else who might have happened upon its property. And, funnily enough, his “guests” seemed almost capable of sensing this, and stayed well clear of trouble.

There is much scope in the study of such competitive insect behaviour. Research on these lines, apart from being of great ecological value, is, let’s face it, extremely entertaining; a scientific paper on sap-attracted insect hierarchy would probably make for more melodramatic reading than the script of a 20th Century Bollywood movie. There’s just no telling what might happen on a sap-exuding tree.

One particularly memorable episode was my chance encounter with the Apefly. Named after the supposed resemblance of its larval stage to the face of an ape, this is a denizen of the wetter forests of India; Chennai leaves much to be desired for a moisture-lover, I’m afraid. And yet there he was, not drawing very much attention to himself, but still hitting me in the eye as something quite out of place ... and the sky, a moment later, never to be seen again.

The Indian Sunbeam downing specially manufactured Spittle Bug sap froth.

So while on the topic of rare visitors, it’s worth also mentioning the sudden, obscure appearance of the lone owlet moth (Lacera sp.) This was an exciting discovery, not just because of the moth’s outright bizarreness, but because, up until then, I’d never crossed paths with a moth sipping sap. I did know that certain species were known to consume sap, of course, but I also knew that absolutely nothing was known about the attraction of Indian moths to the substance. Well, one thing was, for sure to find out, I had to sneak in a visit to the tree at night. Much easier said than done. I resolved to do this at the very next opportunity. Whatever else I did or didn’t do, at least I kept my word. No such opportunities came my way. The nature of nocturnal sap attraction (if at all it exists) is still anybody’s guess.

The temperament of the dialogue so far has, in all likelihood, misled you to the impression that this was a lepidopterans-only bar. If it has, fair enough... butterflies have been the subject matter of the article. Your take on the issue’s still wrong, though. Fauna of all classes and orders thrived on the damp wood. Of these, the most obvious residents were those specialised sap extractors – the scales, the aphids, and the spittle bugs. Only here they weren’t so much extracting as they were just merely engulfing, a process in which their usually useful piercing organs (rostra) actually came in the way. So, when, over the course of the next billion years or so, a new Paran­eop­teran order of sap-consuming insects with vestigial rostra props up, I guess you’ll know why.

With the sap aficionados partying on the trunk day in and day out, it is easy to overlook anything beneath it, for in the degraded, hollow interior, was prime real estate up for grabs – most of the grabbing having been done by a miniscule bee of a brilliant azure hue. Introducing… the Dwarf Carpenter Bee, a subsocial construction worker specialising in all things wooden, rotting and hollow. Dragonflies, on the other hand, would opt for the room with a view, finding in the receding hairline of the tree a most convenient basking spot. And not unlike the lucky lizard, they would be guaranteed the finest cuisine during their stay here.

Other predators, of course, were of no shortage on the tree either. Two of the most prolific predators in Bug land, the Two Striped Telamonia, and the Ant Mantis, are both drawn to the tree for its abundance of prey. Well, they’ve clearly missed the point.

At some vague point during the course of my six-month relation with the tree, I remember having wished that I knew its identity (a rotting stump devoid of leaves doesn’t offer too many leads, to be frank) to add to my growing list of observations made here. I can’t admit to regretting anything more. On one oppressive, sultry, occasion in April, I strode up to the tree confidently expecting a crowd equal in magnitude to the gathering outside the only restroom at a gastroenterologist’s... only to find that!.. and a discerning lack of activity. The Garden Lizard was nowhere to be seen. Not even a Black Rajah remained. The Golden Shower had woken up after a long, long slumber, putting dozens of tiny vascular fluid buffs to sleep. Now only time can tell the future of the sap junkies. So, in the meantime, I shall just have to continue to live in the hope that the “Tree of Life” decides to spring a leak again, and come back to life. – (Courtesy: Madras Naturalists’ Society Bulletin)

Editor’s Note: This extremely well-written, sensitive and knowledgeable article is by a XI Standard student. We wish there were more like him.