Tourists to New Zealand Enjoy a Summer Attraction

CHAN: This time of year thousands of tourists and locals flock to New Zealand's only Butterfly and orchid garden. Set in the beautiful Coromandel peninsular on the East Coast of the North Island, it's not hard to see why. Here's more from our New Zealand Team. STORY: This tropical Butterfly and Orchid Garden is home to over 400 Butterflies. But due to their short life span of about two weeks, the owners need to replace over 700 butterflies every month. Half of the butterflies are breed on the premises and the other half are imported from Asia and South America. [Moana Everton, Local Tourists]: "It's really hot, I've never seen anything like this around at all. Its really good, it's great!" The flowers and Orchids are another major part of the attraction here and with the warm and humid conditions it provides an ideal growing environment. The owner of the garden tells us about one unique flower they grow. [Roger Gass, Butterfly Breeder]: "Its actually not an orchid it's a Dutch mans pipe, it's a very unusual flower it lasts only about two days. It does flower frequently in our Butterfly house. It's the second biggest variety in this family. It has quite a pleasant smell this one, while other in the family have a very unpleasant smell." From the oldest fossils discovered it can be seen that butterflies appeared about 40 million years ago. Currently it is estimated that there are 15,000 butterfly species in the world. The butterflies here enjoy a diet of flowers for breakfast lunch and dinner but also get to feast on a variety of rotten fruit including bananas. This is Gina Shakespear, NTDTV, New Zealand.