Patterns of Ancient Colonization in Hawaii’s most diverse moths (Hyposmocoma: Cosmopterigidae)

Island biogeography is fundamental to understanding colonization, speciation and extinction. Yet the mechanisms of colonization and diversification in new environments remain unclear. Remote volcanic archipelagoes represent ideal natural laboratories for biogeography because they offer a temporally and spatially discrete context for colonization and speciation. The moth genus Hyposmocoma (Cosmopterigidae) is one of the very few lineages that diversified across the entire Hawaiian Archipelago, giving rise to over 350 species, including many restricted to the remote northwestern islands. In contrast with previous studies of the Hawaiian biota, which have suggested that most lineages colonized the archipelago after the emergence of the current high islands (~5 Ma), there have been at least twenty independent colonizations of Hyposmocoma from the remote Northwestern Hawaiian Islands to the current high islands. Hyposmocoma is over 14 million years old, and the ecological requirements of extant groups of Hyposmocoma provide insights into vanished ecosystems on islands that have long since eroded.