A Preliminary Checklist of Guatemala Butterflies: Hesperiidae (Lepidoptera: Hesperioidea)
8 AUSTIN et al: Hesperiidae of Guatemala TROPICAL LEPIDOPTERA TROPICAL LEPIDOPTERA, 9 (Suppl. 2):8-19 A PRELIMINARY CHECKLIST OF GUATEMALA BUTTERFLIES: HESPERIIDAE (LEPIDOPTERA: HESPERIOIDEA) GEORGE T. AUSTIN1, CLAUDIO MENDEZ23, AND ALAN E. LAUNER3 'Nevada State Museum and Historical Society, 700 Twin Lakes Drive, Las Vegas, Nevada 89107, USA Kintro de Estudios Conservacionistas, Universidad de San Carlos, Av. Reforma 0-63, Zona 10, Guatemala City, Guatemala 01010 'Center for Conservation Biology, Stanford University, Stanford, California 94305, USA ABSTRACT.- A total of 384 species of Hesperiidae (Lepidoptera) have been recorded in the literature as occurring in Guatemala. Nearly 200 additional species occur in the adjacent countries of Belize, El Salvador, and Honduras, in the southernmost states of Mexico, or both north and south of Guatemala, and many of these will likely be recorded in the country with additional field work and continuing searches of museum collections. KEY WORDS: Belize, biodiversity, Central America, distribution, El Salvador, Honduras, Mesoamerica, Mexico, Neotropical, systematics. The butterfly faunas of most regions of the Neotropics are, at best, of surrounding countries, and, especially, taxonomic revisions for superficially known. Recent comprehensive checklists are available additional records. for few countries, Mexico (de la Maza et al, 1989, 1991), Trinidad The following list contains only those species specifically and Tobago (Barcant, 1970), Jamaica (Brown and Heineman, 1972), attributed to Guatemala and omits those generally referred to as Hispaniola (Schwartz, 1989), and the entirety of the West Indies occurring throughout Central America and the like. This undoubtedly (Smith et al, 1994). Checklists for local areas are also available omits some widespread and common taxa recorded in Guatemala but (e.g., Austin et al, 1996; Brown and Mielke, 1967a, 1967b; de la removes ambiguities from our collation.
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