PREPRINT Author-formatted, not peer-reviewed document posted on 06/08/2021 DOI: https://doi.org/10.3897/arphapreprints.e72657 An updated checklist of the wild silkmoths (Lepidoptera: Saturniidae) of Colombia Lorenzo Comoglio, Ronald Brechlin Disclaimer on biological nomenclature and use of preprints The preprints are preliminary versions of works accessible electronically in advance of publication of the final version. They are not issued for purposes of botanical, mycological or zoological nomenclature andare not effectively/validly published in the meaning of the Codes. Therefore, nomenclatural novelties (new names) or other nomenclatural acts (designations of type, choices of priority between names, choices between orthographic variants, or choices of gender of names)should NOT be posted in preprints. 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Such advance electronic access does not advance the date of publication of a work, as preliminary versions are not published (Article 9.9)". Author-formatted, not peer-reviewed document posted on 06/08/2021. DOI: https://doi.org/10.3897/arphapreprints.e72657 Lorenzo Comoglio1, Ronald Brechlin2 1Laboratorio de Zoología y Ecología Acuática, Universidad de los Andes, Bogotá, Colombia 2Friedberg 20, D-17309 Pasewalk, Germany Corresponding author: Lorenzo Comoglio ([email protected]) An updated checklist of the wild silkmoths (Lepidoptera: Saturniidae) of Colombia Abstract An updated and comprehensive checklist of wild silkmoths (Lepidoptera: Saturniidae) from Colombia is presented, including their occurrence status in each Colombian department. In Colombia, there are a total of 6 subfamilies, 55 genera, and 602 species of Saturniidae. Current distribution data shows that one genus and 310 species are endemic to Colombia. As a result of the description of many new species for the neotropics, some species names presented in the first checklist of Colombian Saturniidae (Amarillo- Suárez 2000) are obsolete. The following taxa, hitherto treated as subspecies, are raised to species status: Arsenura lemairei Racheli & Racheli, 1998 stat. nov. from A. thomsoni Schaus, 1906; Copiopteryx banghaasi Draudt, 1930 stat. nov. from C. semiramis (Cramer, 1775); and Rhescyntis norax Druce, 1897 stat. nov. from R. hippodamia Druce, 1897. A new combination is proposed in this context: Copiopteryx banghaasi andensis (Lemaire, 1974) comb. nov. In addition, Bathyphlebia aglia gschwandneri Schawerda, 1925 stat. nov. is removed from its synonymy with B. aglia Felder & Felder, 1874 and here treated as a subspecies of the latter. Furthermore, Rothschildia equatorialis bogotana Rothschild, 1907 stat. rev., comb. nov. is reinstated as a subspecies, but now from equatorialis Rothschild, 1907 and not from orizaba (Westwood, 1853). The following taxa are recognized as new synonyms: Rhescyntis hippodamia colombiana (Bouvier, 1927) syn. nov. of Rhescyntis norax Druce, 1897, Therinia transversaria columbiana (Jordan, 1924) syn. nov. of Therinia transversaria (Druce, 1887), and Rothschildia arethusa rhodina Jordan, 1911 syn nov. of Rothschildia arethusa (Walker, 1855). Old records of taxa that recently could not be found in Colombia have been removed due to new evidence. The purpose is to avoid confusion with old names and provide an updated list of Colombian species, including many recently described taxa. Keywords Bombycoidea, distribution, endemics, neotropics, South America Introduction “This great diversity of entirely American groups in the Saturniidae […], suggests that the group as a whole arose in the Western Hemisphere and no doubt in the American tropics.” (Michener 1952: 371) The Saturniidae, known as wild silkmoths, are the largest family of the Bombycoidea superfamily and occur almost worldwide. However, they are most diverse in the tropics, where it has been hypothesized that they have their origins (Regier et al. 2008). A recent global list of valid names for Saturniidae comprises 3,454 species in 180 genera (Kitching et al. 2018), and nearly 2,400 species are estimated to occur in the neotropics (Decaëns et al. 2021). In the neotropics, the Saturniidae family is divided into six Author-formatted, not peer-reviewed document posted on 06/08/2021. DOI: https://doi.org/10.3897/arphapreprints.e72657 subfamilies: Arsenurinae, Ceratocampinae, Cercophaninae, Hemileucinae, Oxyteninae, and Saturniinae, the latter being the only cosmopolitan, while the others are exclusively neotropical (Lemaire and Minet 1998). Lemaire (1978, 1980, 1988, 2002) reviewed four American subfamilies of this family and listed 921 species for the neotropics (1996) before publishing his great work with three volumes about Hemileucinae (2002). Amarillo-Suárez (2000) reported a total number of 183 species (the original number of 185 is incorrect due to duplicate records) in 46 genera in the first Saturniidae checklist of Colombia. Both Lemaire (1996) and Amarillo-Suárez (2000) had excluded the subfamilies Cercophaninae and Oxyteninae from their checklists. These most basal subfamilies were first reviewed by Jordan (1924) and reassigned to Saturniidae based on morphological characters (Minet 1994), later confirmed by phylogenetic evidence (Regier et al. 2008). The geographic complexity of Colombia makes its fauna extraordinarily diverse and highly endemic. The topography is characterized by three main parallel Andean mountain ranges, known as Cordilleras, located within the Tropical Andes biodiversity hotspot (Myers et al. 2000). The Andean region is bordered to the east by the Orinoquía and Amazon regions, and to the west by the Chocó biogeographic region, another biodiversity hotspot (Myers et al. 2000). The three Andean mountain ranges are separated by the two large, major streams of Colombia, the Cauca River, which flows northward between the Western and Central Cordilleras, and the Magdalena River, which divides the Central and Eastern Cordilleras. After emerging from the mountains, these two rivers unite and descend to the Caribbean Sea. On the margin of the Caribbean, there is the Sierra Nevada of Santa Marta, whose highest elevations are the tallest peaks in Colombia. This area is also an essential hotspot of biodiversity that hosts many endemic species (Myers et al. 2000). Despite the growing interest and popularity of wild silkmoths, the literature dealing with the distribution of Colombian Saturniidae is limited. A few ecological studies included lists for specific locations: Río Ñambí Natural Reserve, Barbacoas, Nariño (Amarillo-Suárez 1997); San José del Palmar, Chocó (Decaëns et al. 2003b); Tambito Reserve, El Tambo, Cauca (Muñoz and Amarillo-Suárez 2010); Gorgona Island National Park, Guapí, Cauca (Calero-Mejía et al. 2014); and Utría National Park, Chocó (Prada Lara et al. 2019) in the Chocó Biogeographic region; Albania, Caquetá, in the Orinoquía region (Racheli and Vinciguerra 2005); and Arcabuco and Quipama, Boyacá, in the Andean region (Decaëns et al. 2007). Approximately 1,500 new species and subspecies of Saturniidae have been described in the last decade (Kitching et al. 2018). This enormous number is mainly due to DNA studies (Hebert et al. 2003, Padial et al. 2010). Despite being controversially discussed (Will and Rubinoff 2004, Will et al. 2005, Peigler 2013), DNA barcoding is now widely recognized as a tool for revealing cryptic Lepidoptera species (Decaëns and Rougerie 2008, Vaglia et al. 2008, Gibbs 2009, Hausmann et al. 2009, Van Velzen et al. 2009, Decaëns et al. 2021). Today integrative taxonomy combines morphological features, geographic distribution, and COI barcode studies (Silva-Brandão et al. 2009 provide an extensive review on the subject) and nuclear markers to increase resolution (Rougerie et al. 2012). It is not surprising that many of the newly described Saturniidae are distributed in Colombia due to the variety of the ecosystems, the existence of biodiversity hotspots, and the recent sampling boosting, especially at high elevations, in previously inaccessible localities. Since 2008, many descriptions of neotropical Saturniidae have been published in the Entomo-Satsphingia journal, as well as two major revisions of the genera Hylesia Hübner, [1820] (Brechlin et al. 2016a) and Janiodes Jordan, 1924 (Brechlin 2020e). The most striking result was the recent description of the new genus Winbrechlinia Author-formatted, not peer-reviewed document posted on 06/08/2021. DOI: https://doi.org/10.3897/arphapreprints.e72657 Brechlin, 2016, endemic to the cloud forests and páramos of the Sierra Nevada of Santa Marta in northern Colombia (Brechlin 2016f, 2018m, 2020d). The aim is to present an updated checklist of the known Saturniidae from Colombia in light of the many new