Biology and External Morphology of Immatures of O psiphanes quiteria meridionalis Staudinger (Lepidoptera: Nymphalidae)

Abstract

The genus Opsiphanes Doubleday occurs in the Neotropics. Adults belong to the guild of frugivorous butterflies and use as host plants some genera of Arecaceae and Musaceae. The present study provides information on the biology and describes the external morphology of immatures of the species Opsiphanes quiteria meridionalis Staudinger obtained from females collected in the Atlantic Forest of southern Bahia, Brazil. The development of immatures was monitored and photographed in the laboratory. The larvae were fed with leaves of Dypsis lutescens (Arecaceae), an ornamental plant. The egg stage lasted, on average, 7.2 days. The larval stage had five instars, with an average duration of 48.5 days. The pupal stage lasted 16.5 days. The average growth rate of the head capsule was 1.5 mm.

Egg and First Instar of the Neotropical Geometrid MothPero obtusariaProut (Geometridae: Ennominae: Azelinini)

“…Detailed knowledge of external morphology of immature stages is widely recognized as an important tool in studies dealing with the evolution and systematics of Lepidoptera (Dias et al 2015, Hernández-Mejía et al 2015, Salik et al 2015, Dolinskaya 2016, Neves & Paluch 2016, Nieves-Uribe et al 2016. Therefore, the objective of this study is to describe and illustrate the external morphology of the egg and first instar of P. obtusaria based on light and scanning electron microscopy, providing the first morphological observations of immature stages of a Neotropical species of Pero.…”