The 2005 ESA Annual Meeting and Exhibition
December 15-18, 2005
Ft. Lauderdale, FL

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Friday, December 16, 2005
D0159

The importance of color pattern in the speciation of Heliconius heurippa (Lepidoptera: Nymphalidae)

Christian Salcedo, salcedo@ufl.edu, University of Florida, Entomology, McGuire Center for Lepidoptera and Biodiversity, S.W. 34th Street and Hull Road P.O. Box 112710, Gainesville, FL

Heliconius heurippa represents a possible case of speciation associated to introgressive hybridization. This particular species presents a wing color pattern that combines genetic elements from its possible parental species: H. melpomene and H. cydno. Butterfly models were used in approach and courtship experiments to test if sexual selection associated to wing color pattern has influenced the speciation of H. heurippa. A total of five models were used built from real and paper wings that resembled H. cydno, H. melpomene, H. heurippa, H. heurippa modified, showing only red color, and H. heurippa modified, showing only yellow color.

The results confirm that wing color pattern is very important in mate choice within these three species and in particular the “mixed” color pattern “cydno-melpomene” that posses H. heurippa. H. melpomene and H. cydno males showed preference towards its own color pattern in all cases. Following the same fashion, H. heurippa males preferred its own color pattern. This suggests that there is positive assortative mating leaded by wing color pattern for the three species under study and that the combination of colors that H. heurippa presents constitutes a mate choice signal. In conclusion, mate choice associated to wing color pattern is not only important to the precigotic reproductive isolation but also possibly played a keyrole in the origin of H. heurippa through hybridization between H. melpomene and H. cydno.



Species 1: Lepidoptera Nymphalidae Heliconius heurippa
Species 2: Lepidoptera Nymphalidae Heliconius cydno
Species 3: Lepidoptera Nymphalidae Heliconius melpomene
Keywords: Sexual selection, Hybridization

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COMMENTS AND CORRECTIONS

  • From James Taber, Mr. (high school biology teacher), Central Catholic High School, October 30, 2006
    I would suggest (as two alternative hypotheses) that Heliconius heurippa, having both color stripes, could 1) be a reversion to an ancestrial coloration or 2)that the wild H. heurippa could be a remnant of the ancestrial stock that gave rise to the other two species. I would also suggest that some lab isolate the eye pigments of the three species and do absorption spectral analysis. I would also like to see a follow-up experiment where the color patterns were reversed (replacing the red with the yellow and the yellow with the red or having two red stripes or two yellow stripes) to eliminate the possibility that the patterns are more important than the colors themselves. Finally, I thought that most species of butterflies were blind to red, orange and somewhat to yellow. What are the UV patterns of the wings of these species? The above analysis of eye pigments is very important to verify these findings. Nice paper with important implications.