Graham Wurtz is well known across the Border for his sporting exploits.
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The 70-year-old from Thurgoona is an Australian senior tennis champion for his age division and he has competed in the Australian Open but he has another passion.
He’s a dedicated lepidopterist.
If you want to get the knockabout shooter and hunter’s attention, ask him about butterflies – he can happily talk for hours on the topic.
With more than 11,000 specimens in his display cabinets and drawers, Mr Wurtz has the Border’s largest collection of butterflies, bugs and beetles.
It’s a hobby that constantly intrigues family and friends.
“They can’t work me out,” he says with a wry smile.
“I do a lot of sport. I played state squash and all the tennis, I played in the Australian Open in my time, and then I went chasing pigs for 10 years, and hunting foxes. I tan the hide and make rugs.
“Now here I am walking around with a butterfly net catching butterflies.”
He got the bug while living in Canberra in the late 1970s, when a neighbour showed him some butterflies collected from Papua New Guinea.
He was told about a lepidopterists club in the city and recognised a name on the member’s list from his tennis. “There was a bit of a club in Canberra, so they gave me a pamphlet … I started from there,” he says.
“We went out in the Brindabellas and collected a few. It just rolled on from there.
“I hate just sitting around. Every time we went over to the coast, I’m not one for swimming in the water, I’d just go walking around the side of the bush and I’d see them.
“I started with a small box but I soon filled those up and then it got to the stage where I had to start making a cabinet, then I’d have to make another one.”
He says through his butterfly hobby, he’s been able to see most of Australia, including several treks to the top of Cape York and the Torres Strait and Tiwi islands collecting butterflies.
“I would never had been up to the Torres Strait Islands, or Cape York Peninsula, or all these spots if I hadn’t been collecting.
“It is interesting to see where they come from, and keeps you active.
“It’s fascinating – they are so colourful.”