Neotropical Eois (Lepidoptera: Geometridae): Checklist, Biogeography, Diversity, and Description Patterns

Abstract

The moth genus Eois Hübner (Lepidoptera: Geometridae: Larentiinae) comprises 254 validly described species, 211 of them (83%) occurring in the Neotropical region, 12% in the Asian-Australian region, and 5% in Africa. A checklist of Neotropical Eois is provided and some taxonomic changes are made. Aplogompha noctilaria (Schaus) is excluded from the genus, and Eois bermellada (Dognin) and Eois fragilis (Warren) are transferred to the genus. Further changes include Eois cellulata (Prout) stat. rev., Eois ambarilla (Dognin) stat. rev., and Eois telegraphica Prout stat. rev. By far, the majority of Eois species (82%) were described between 1891 and 1920; approximately half of all species by just two authors. Within the Neotropical region, the majority of species (55%) were described from the tropical Andes (Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, and Bolivia), followed by Central America and the Caribbean (28%), and the rest of South America (17%). Large regions such as the Amazon basin, eastern South America, but also northern Peru are heavily underrepresented. Regional diversity studies provide evidence that the wet tropical Andes are the diversity hotspot of Eois. From a forested elevational gradient (1,020–2,670 m above sea level) in southeastern Ecuador, 154 morphospecies are currently known, with only ≈12% of them described. Regional species richness in Central America is lower (Costa Rica, 66 observed morphospecies along a gradient from 40 to 2,730 m; ≈29% described). Total richness of the genus is estimated to be >1,000 species in the Neotropical region. R the low proportions of described species only partly recur in other groups of Neotropical geometrid moths, their number may exceed 19,000 species. A taxonomic revision of Eois will be a prerequisite for comparison of ecological data from different regions.

Revision of the genus Callipia Guenée, 1858 (Lepidoptera, Geometridae), with the description of 15 new taxa

“…The situation in less conspicuous taxa is much worse: higher proportions of species still remain undescribed, and many species of small taxa (such as Eupithecia Curtis, 1825) still need to be sampled, because they are not represented in any museum collection. For example, Brehm et al (2011) estimated the percentage of undescribed species in the Neotropical Larentiinae genus Eois Hübner, 1818 at 85%.…”

“…Only 23 years later the second species of the genus -C. constantinaria (Oberthür, 1881) -was described (Oberthür 1881). Twelve further taxa were described between 1904 and 1914 by Thierry-Mieg (1904), Warren (1904Warren ( , 1905Warren ( , 1907 and Dognin (1913Dognin ( , 1914, and two by Sperry (1951), reflecting a typical temporal pattern and peak of taxonomic activity around 1900 also found in many other Neotropical geometrid taxa (Gaston et al 1995;Brehm et al 2011;Brehm 2015). In their catalogue of geometrid moths, Parsons et al (1999) treated 15 of these 16 taxa; only the taxon C. confluens Warren, 1907 is not listed in the catalogue, it was originally described as a form of Callipia balteata Warren, 1905.…”

Host conservatism, geography, and elevation in the evolution of a Neotropical moth radiation

“…More than 250 Eois species have been formally described, 83% of which are restricted to the New World; however, the true diversity of the genus is estimated at more than 1000 species in the Neotropics alone (Brehm et al. ). Eois caterpillars are highly specialized feeders, with each species typically feeding on only one or two host species (Connahs et al.…”

“…) have focused almost exclusively on species found at three collection localities—Southern Ecuador, Central Ecuador, and Costa Rica—even though Eois occurs throughout the Neotropics from southern Mexico to northern Argentina (Brehm et al. ). The full distributional range of this genus spans regions that were dramatically affected by complex geological change over the past 50 million years, including the rise of the Andes (Hoorn et al.…”

Host Plant Associations and Parasitism of South EcuadorianEoisSpecies (Lepidoptera: Geometridae) Feeding onPeperomia(Piperaceae)

“…Since the beginning of this century, the pantropically distributed genus Eois Hübner has attracted increasing interest with regard to ecological and evolutionary research. In the Neotropics, 211 species of this genus have thus far been validly described ( Brehm et al. 2011 ), but estimates by Rodríguez-Castañeda et al.…”