Cube butterfly

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Cube butterfly
Abisara echerius

Abisara echerius

Systematics
Class : Insects (Insecta)
Order : Butterflies (Lepidoptera)
Subordination : Glossata
Partial order : Heteroneura
Superfamily : Papilionoidea
Family : Cube butterfly
Scientific name
Riodinidae
Grote , 1895
Subfamilies

The cubed butterflies (Riodinidae) are a very diverse family of butterflies. They are distributed worldwide with 1532 species in 146 genera (status: 2011). Their main distribution is in the Neotropic , in North America only 26 species occur, in Europe the cowslip cube butterfly ( Hamearis lucina ) is the only representative. It is still unclear whether the taxon should be managed as a subfamily of the bluebells (Lycaenidae) or as an independent family.

The German name Würfelfalter for the group is not entirely clear. Other species whose German name is also the name can contain riodinidae belong to the family of Skipper , such as small southern riodinidae ( Pyrgus malvoides ) spialia sertorius ( Spialia Sertorius ), olive skipper ( Pyrgus serratulae ). The name is derived from the "diced" spot drawing on the forewings of the European species.

features

butterfly

The family includes small to medium-sized species, about 12 to 60 millimeters in span, often with vivid colors. The shape of the wing is very different within the family. They often recall Falter other groups, some see eye butterflies similar bright yellow reminiscent of yellow pieces (Coli Adinae) and some have tails as in the Ritter butterflies are found. The color ranges from muted colors, as can be found mainly in the temperate zones, to iridescent blue and green wings and transparent wings. The golden or silvery metallic spots on the wings of many American species have earned them the common English name "Metalmarks". A number of species imitate poisonous moths from other families ( Bates'sche mimicry ), they often belong to extensive "rings" of similar-looking species that are grouped around a deterrent model. Due to the mimicry, closely related species often have completely different wing drawings, such as the species of the genus Thisbe . Many species imitate e.g. B. the stain and stripe pattern of the poisonous Ithomiini (noble butterfly). Batesian mimicry appears to be more common in the family than in any other insect family of comparable size. The reasons for this are unknown.

It is difficult to distinguish it from the closely related bluebells by morphological autapomorphies . The male's first pair of legs, which arise on the prothorax , is less than half the length of the legs of the pterothorax and is not used for running. The individual parts of the tarsi are fused with each other, sometimes also with the tibia, and the pretarsi have no claws. This feature is also found in some bluebells (and also in the noble butterflies ), but with these the legs are always significantly longer. The sensory hairs on the tarsi of the female front legs are arranged in a group. In the other taxa of the Papilionoidea, these are found in groups arranged in pairs. The third autapomorphy is due to the lack of the posterior appendages ( apophyses ) of the female genitalia. This feature is also found in some species of the Poritiinae subfamily .

In almost all cube-shaped butterflies, the hips ( coxae ) of the forelegs of the males are elongated into a point that protrudes over the trochanter ( only hinted at in Styx infernalis and Corrachia leucoplaga ). If similar tips occur in bluebells (e.g. genera Curetis , Feniseca , Poritia ), they are built differently in detail (e.g. dorsally vaulted). In addition, in contrast to the Lycaenidae, almost all Riodinidae have a humeral vein in the hind wing, and the Costa vein is thickened (exceptions in the subfamily Hamearinae). In addition, the head is usually somewhat wider in relation to the eyes, which means that the antenna bases are slightly removed from the eye. The antennae, which are typically culled at the end of butterflies, are usually relatively long, they often reach half the fore wing length.

Riodinidae show an unusual variety of chromosome numbers, only a few very basal groups have n = 29 to 31, which is typical for butterflies, or n = 23 to 24, which is characteristic of bluebells. Numbers between 9 and 110 occur. In some cases representatives of one kind have variable numbers, an indication of morphologically indistinguishable cryptospecies .

Caterpillars and eggs

The eggs are shaped relatively differently, many are flattened and have the shape of a dome or a turban, but are structured as usual with the bluebells. The caterpillars are usually hairy longer than those of the blues; Exception: the myrmecophilic species (living in ants).

Biology and way of life

Species of the family occur in a multitude of different habitats, but have a clear distribution center in the tropical rainforests of South America. Many species are rarely found and have a relatively small range. Species of the genus Charis were therefore used to reconstruct the forest history of the Amazon basin : each of the 19 species has a vicarious distribution area; three originally separate forest areas (upper, lower Amazon, Guyana ) can be derived from the relationship between the species .

For less than ten percent of the species, studies on biology or way of life are even available. The food plants of the caterpillars include a total of more than 40 different plant families. Mostly young leaves or flowers are used, rarely dead leaves or lichen and other growth. The caterpillars usually feed individually (solitary), less often gregarious ( gregarious ). The caterpillar of at least one species, Setabis lagus (Riodininae: Nymphidiini), is said to feed on predatory food. There is information about predation of larvae of Horiola sp. (Fam. Membracidae ) as well as of cup scale insects (Coccidae). Predatory nutrition of some other species is suspected based on their egg-laying behavior, but has not been proven.

According to a study in Ecuador, the extensive equation of adult butterflies with flower visitors, which is common for temperate species, does not necessarily apply to Riodinidae. Of the males of 317 registered species, 124 were observed eating or were baited on appropriate traps. Flowers were not registered in any subfamily with a share of more than ten percent. Most species either sought out more decomposed carrion, rotting fish, or (preferably nitrogen-rich) damp mud on puddles or river banks. No species of decomposing fruit was found. Most of the species without observed feeding were small and not very active in flight.

Relationships with ants

Like their sister family Lycaenidae, numerous species of the Riodinidae are myrmekophil , that is, they have a close ecological bond with ants (about 280 species). The caterpillars of numerous species have special organs which have been shown to have a soothing or attracting effect on ants. Numerous Riodinid caterpillars have retractable and evertable so-called "tentacle nectar organs" on the eighth segment of the abdomen, which secrete a secretion that ants prefer to eat. Other tentacle organs on the third segment of the abdomen release messenger substances ( allomones ) that have an effect on ants; other studies also indicate acoustic signals ( stridulation ). Although the position of the organs does not correspond in detail to that of similar organs in blue caterpillars, the similar histological structure suggests homologous origin. It is therefore possible that the common ancestor of the Lycaenidae and Riodinidae could have already possessed the special bond with ants, which is not found in this form in any other butterfly group, and that it has been lost in the species without this characteristic. The data suggest, however, that different lines of the Riodinidae, presumably in three groups independently of one another, have acquired the way of life and the corresponding characteristics convergent.

Phylogeny and Systematics

The group was traditionally mostly regarded as one of the subfamilies of the blues and then called Riodininae. Today most systematics prefer to see them as an independent family, even if there are arguments against it. On a morphological basis, Ackery et al. they in the Handbuch der Zoologie (Kristensen 1998, cf. under literature) still within the Lycaenidae. Kristensen et al. accepted the family rank in the update of the 2007 manual, at least on a provisional basis.

In molecular phylogenies (based on homologous DNA sequences) there is almost identical sister group relationship between the Riodinidae and the Lycaenidae, which can therefore be considered very well established.

The family is divided into the following subfamilies

Some taxonomists recognize two very different species, Styx infernalis and Corrachia leucoplaga , each with their own subfamily Styginae or Corrachiinae, but mostly these are now included as tribes in the Euselasiinae, this view is followed here. All of the fewer than 100 species found in the ancient world belong to the Nemeobiinae.

Economic importance

The importance of Riodinidae species as pests is very low. A few species of the Euselasiinae feed on Myrtaceae with economic importance, such as guava . Few Riodininae have been reported to be harmful to bred Bromeliceae or Orchidaceae.

Fossils

Fossil butterflies are seldom found, and fossil butterflies are extremely rare. From the family Riodinidae there are only two, possibly three, fossil finds. The first fossil riodinide was found in Dominican amber (15 to 25 million years old, Miocene ) in 2004 (the allocation of the species Riodinella nympha from the Middle Eocene Green River Formation from Colorado, USA to the family is controversial). The fossil species was called Voltinia dramba and thus classified in the recent genus Voltinia . On Hispaniola no way lives the family more (and the entire Antilles only one).

The only fossil riodinid caterpillar was also found in Dominican amber and assigned to the recent genus Theope . The caterpillar shows the same morphological adaptations that are typical of today's myrmecophilic species, and the caterpillars of recent species also live in symbiosis with ants. The age of the symbiosis can thus be dated back to the Miocene.

swell

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Erik J. van Nieukerken, Lauri Kaila, Ian J. Kitching, Niels P. Kristensen, David C. Lees, Joël Minet, Charles Mitter, Marko Mutanen, Jerome C. Regier, Thomas J. Simonsen, Niklas Wahlberg, Shen-Horn Yen, Reza Zahiri, David Adamski, Joaquin Baixeras, Daniel Bartsch, Bengt Å. Bengtsson, John W. Brown, Sibyl Rae Bucheli, Donald R. Davis, Jurate De Prins, Willy De Prins, Marc E. Epstein, Patricia Gentili-Poole, Cees Gielis, Peter Hättenschwiler, Axel Hausmann, Jeremy D. Holloway, Axel Kallies , Ole Karsholt, Akito Y. Kawahara, Sjaak (JC) Koster, Mikhail V. Kozlov, J. Donald Lafontaine, Gerardo Lamas, Jean-François Landry, Sangmi Lee, Matthias Nuss, Kyu-Tek Park, Carla Penz, Jadranka Rota, Alexander Schintlmeister, B. Christian Schmidt, Jae-Cheon Sohn, M. Alma Solis, Gerhard M. Tarmann, Andrew D. Warren, Susan Weller, Roman V. Yakovlev, Vadim V. Zolotuhin, Andreas Zwick (2011): Order Lepidoptera Linnaeus , 1758. In: Zhang, Z.-Q. (Editor) Animal biodiversity: An outline of higher-level classification and survey of taxonomic richness. Zootaxa 3148: 212-221.
  2. ↑ a b Thomas C. Emmel: Wonderful and mysterious world of butterflies . Ed .: Edward S. Ross. 1st edition. Bertelsmann. Gütersloh / Berlin 1976, ISBN 3-570-00893-2 .
  3. ↑ Riodininae in Fauna Europaea. Retrieved December 29, 2007
  4. ↑ a b c J.PW Hall (2004): Metalmark Butterflies (Lepidoptera: Riodinidae) In JL Capinera (editor) Encyclopedia of Entomology, Vol. 2 Kluwer Academic Publishers, 2004. pp. 1383-1386.
  5. ↑ Mathieu Joron (2008): Batesian Mimicry: Can a Leopard Change Its Spots - and Get Them Back? Current Biology Volume 18, Issue 11: R476-R479. doi: 10.1016 / j.cub.2008.04.009
  6. ↑ Carla M. Penz & Philip J. DeVries (2001): A phylogenetic reassessment of Thisbe and Uraneis butterflies (Riodinidae, Nymphidiini). Contributions in Science 485: 1-27.
  7. ↑ a b K.S. Brown Jr., B. von Schoultz, AO Saura, A. Saura (2012): Chromosomal evolution in the South American Riodinidae (Lepidoptera: Papilionoidea). Hereditas 149: 128-138. doi: 10.1111 / j.1601-5223.2012.02250.x
  8. ↑ a b Philip R. Ackery, Rienk de Jong, Richard I. Vane-Wright: The Butterflies: Hedyloidea, Hesperioidea, Papilionoidea. In: Niels P. Kristensen (editor): Lepidoptera, Moths and Butterflies. Volume 1: Evolution, Systematics, and Biogeography. Walter de Gruvter, Berlin & New York 1999. cf. pp. 283-284
  9. ↑ Rienk de Jong, Philip R. Ackery, Richard I. Vane-Wright (1996): The higher classification of butterflies (Lepidoptera): problems and prospects. Insect Systematics & Evolution, Volume 27, Issue 1: 65-101. doi: 10.1163 / 187631296X00205
  10. ^ Robert K. Robbins (1988): Comparative morphology of the butterfly foreleg coxa and trochanter (Lepidoptera) and its systematic implications. Proceedings of the Entomological Society of Washington 90 (2): 133-154.
  11. ↑ Jason PW Hall & Donald J. Harvey (2002): The phylogeography of Amazonia revisited: new evidence from Riodinid butterflies. Evolution, 56 (7): 1489-1497.
  12. ↑ Keith S. Brown jr .: Neotropical Lycaenidae: an overview. In: The IUCN Species Survival Commission: Conservation biology of Lycaenidae Butterflies. Occasional Paper of the IUCN Species Survival Commission No. 8, 1993. ISBN 2-8317-0159-7
  13. ↑ a b P.J. DeVries, IA Chacon, D. Murray (1992): Toward a better understanding of host use and biodiversity in riodinid butterflies (Lepidoptera). Journal of Research on the Lepidoptera 31 (1-2): 103-126.
  14. ↑ Jason PW Hall & Keith R. Willmott (2000): Patterns of feeding behavior in adult male riodinid butterflies and their relationship to morphology and ecology. Biological Journal of the Linnean Society 69: 1-23. doi: 10.1006 / bijl.1999.0345
  15. ^ A b Dana L. Campbell and Naomi E. Pierce (2003): Phylogenetic relationships of the Riodinidae: Implications for the evolution of ant association. In: C. Boggs, P. Ehrlich, WB Watt (editors). Butterflies as Model Systems. Chicago University Press: 395-408. download ( Memento of the original from December 3, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.oeb.harvard.edu
  16. ↑ Jonathan Walter Saunders: Molecular Phylogenetics of the Riodinidae (Lepidoptera). Thesis, University of Florida, 2010.
  17. ↑ Fang Zhao, Dun-Yuan Huang, Xiao-Yan Sun, Qing-Hui Shi, Jia-Sheng Hao, Lan-Lan Zhang, Qun Yang: The first mitochondrial genome for the butterfly family Riodinidae (Abisara fylloides) and its systematic implications . In: Dong Wu Xue Yan Jiu = Zoological Research . tape 34 , E4-E5, October 2013, pp. E109-E119 , PMID 24115668 .
  18. ↑ Niels P. Kristensen, Malcolm J. Scoble, Ole Karsholt (2007): Lepidoptera phylogeny and systematics: the state of inventorying moth and butterfly diversity. Zootaxa 1668: 699-747.
  19. ↑ Niklas Wahlberg, Michael F Braby, Andrew VZ Brower, Rienk de Jong, Ming-Min Lee, Sören Nylin, Naomi E Pierce, Felix AH Sperling, Roger Vila, Andrew D Warren and Evgueni Zakharov (2005): Synergistic effects of combining morphological and molecular data in resolving the phylogeny of butterflies and skippers. Proceedings of the Royal Society Series B 272: 1577-1586. doi: 10.1098 / rspb.2005.3124
  20. ↑ Maria Heikkilä, Lauri Kaila, Marko Mutanen, Carlos Peña, Niklas Wahlberg (2012) Cretaceous origin and repeated tertiary diversification of the redefined butterflies. Proceedings of the Royal Society Series B 279: 1093-1099. doi: 10.1098 / rspb.2011.1430
  21. ↑ cf. z. B. Andrew VZ Brower (2008): Riodinidae Grote 1895. Metalmarks. Version 01 January 2008 (under construction). [1] in The Tree of Life Web Project.
  22. ↑ Jae-Cheon Sohn, Conrad Labandeira, Donald Davis, Charles Mitter (2002): An annotated catalog of fossil and subfossil Lepidoptera (Insecta: Holometabola) of the world. Zootaxa 3286: 1-132.
  23. ↑ Christopher J. Durden & Hugh Rose (1978): Butterflies from the Middle Eocene: The earliest occurrence of fossil Papilionoidea (Lepidoptera). Texas Memorial Museum, The Pearce - Sellards Series No.29: 1-25.
  24. ↑ Jason PW Hall, Robert K. Robbins, Donald J. Harvey (2004): Extinction and biogeography in the Caribbean: new evidence from a fossil riodinid butterfly in Dominican amber. Proceedings of the Royal Society Series B vol. 271 no.1541: 797-801. doi: 10.1098 / rspb.2004.2691
  25. ^ PJ DeVries and GO Poinar (1997): Ancient butterfly-ant symbiosis: direct evidence from Dominican amber. Proceedings of the Royal Society Series B vol. 264 no. 1385: 1137-1140. doi: 10.1098 / rspb.1997.0157

literature

  • Niels P. Kristensen: Lepidoptera, moths and butterflies . In: Maximilian Fischer (Ed.): Handbook of Zoology . 1st edition. tape 4 - Arthropoda: Insecta , volume 35. de Gruyter, Berlin / New York 1998, ISBN 3-11-015704-7 (English).
  • Malcolm J. Scoble: The Lepidoptera: Form, Function and Diversity . Oxford University Press, Oxford 1995, ISBN 0-19-854952-0 (English).

Web links

Commons : Riodininae  - collection of images, videos and audio files