MACROECOLOGY OF NEOTROPICAL CLEARWING BUTTERFLIES (NYMPHALIDAE: ITHOMIINI) By GEOFFREY R. GALLICE A THESIS PRESENTED TO THE GRADUATE SCHOOL OF THE UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF SCIENCE UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA 2011 1 © 2011 Geoffrey R. Gallice 2 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS First and foremost, I thank Keith Willmott of the Florida Museum of Natural History for providing invaluable guidance and assistance from start to finish, from the development of my project to planning field work in Ecuador, from providing butterfly distributional data essential for modeling ranges to identifying specimens. Without his generous support and insightful discussions, this project would not have been possible. In Ecuador, I thank the Ministerio del Ambiente for granting me permission to conduct field work in Ecuador, and Santiago Villamarín for facilitating the acquisition of the required research/collecting and export permits. The Reserva Biológica Jatun Sacha, Estación Científica Yasuní of the Pontificia Universidad Católica del Ecuador, and Tiputini Biodiversity Station of the Universidad San Francisco de Quito all provided permission to conduct research at their facilities. I am especially grateful to Yarina Lodge and Sacha Lodge for providing outstanding accommodations at their tourist lodges. Cristina Maribel Porras was helpful in data collection at Jatun Sacha. The McGuire Center for Lepidoptera and Biodiversity provided financial assistance in the form of a research assistantship, and granted me access to their substantial Ithomiini collections. The Dean of the College of Agricultural and Life Sciences at the University of Florida provided additional funding in the form of a teaching assistantship. The National Science Foundation provided a fellowship to fund my final year of study at the University of Florida. The Tropical Conservation and Development Program at the University of Florida and the Sophie Danforth Conservation Biology Fund at the Roger Williams Park Zoo in Providence, RI, provided generous support in the form of grants for field work. 3 TABLE OF CONTENTS page ACKNOWLEDGMENTS .................................................................................................. 3 LIST OF TABLES ............................................................................................................ 6 LIST OF FIGURES .......................................................................................................... 7 ABSTRACT ..................................................................................................................... 8 CHAPTER 1 GENERAL INTRODUCTION ...................................................................................... 10 Macroecology ......................................................................................................... 10 Study Group ............................................................................................................ 11 Objectives ............................................................................................................... 13 2 MODELING ITHOMIINE BUTTERFLY RANGES ....................................................... 14 Introduction ............................................................................................................. 14 Methods .................................................................................................................. 18 Data .................................................................................................................. 18 Modeling Butterfly Ranges ............................................................................... 19 Results .................................................................................................................... 20 Range Size Frequency Distributions ................................................................ 20 Ecological niche modeling.......................................................................... 20 Minimum convex polygon........................................................................... 21 Discussion .............................................................................................................. 22 3 SPECIES RELATIVE DENSITY WITHIN BUTTERFLY COMMUNITIES ................... 26 Introduction ............................................................................................................. 26 Methods .................................................................................................................. 28 Study Sites and Butterfly Sampling .................................................................. 28 Completeness of Sampling and Species Richness at Sites ............................. 29 The Relationship Between Mean Local Density and Body Size ....................... 30 Results .................................................................................................................... 30 Relative Species Density .................................................................................. 30 Completeness of Sampling and Species Richness at Sites ............................. 30 The Relationship Between Mean Local Density and Body Size ....................... 31 Discussion .............................................................................................................. 31 4 THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN DENSITY AND DISTRIBUTION ........................... 39 Introduction ............................................................................................................. 39 4 Methods .................................................................................................................. 40 Data .................................................................................................................. 40 Statistical Analysis ............................................................................................ 41 Results .................................................................................................................... 43 Discussion .............................................................................................................. 44 5 DISPERSAL ABILITY AND DISTRIBUTION .............................................................. 53 Introduction ............................................................................................................. 53 Overview .......................................................................................................... 53 Defining Dispersal ............................................................................................ 53 Objectives ......................................................................................................... 54 Methods .................................................................................................................. 55 Dispersal Ability ................................................................................................ 55 Range Size ....................................................................................................... 56 Statistical Analysis ............................................................................................ 56 Results .................................................................................................................... 56 Discussion .............................................................................................................. 56 6 GENERAL CONCLUSIONS ....................................................................................... 61 Macroecology and Study Group ............................................................................. 61 Species Range Sizes .............................................................................................. 61 Relative Density Within Butterfly Communities ....................................................... 61 The Relationship Between Density and Distribution ............................................... 62 The Relationship Between Dispersal Ability and Distribution .................................. 62 Outlook ................................................................................................................... 62 APPENDIX BUTTERFLIES COLLECTED IN THE FIELD WITH RANGE SIZES............................. 64 LIST OF REFERENCES ............................................................................................... 67 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH ............................................................................................ 76 5 LIST OF TABLES Table page 3-1 Field sites in Ecuador, August-December 2010 ................................................. 34 6 LIST OF FIGURES Figure page 2-1 Frequency distributions of butterfly range sizes.. ................................................ 24 2-2 Arithmetic plot showing correlation between range size estimates obtained using two independent methods. ........................................................................ 25 3-1 Field sites in eastern Ecuador.. .......................................................................... 35 3-2 Species rank abundance curves (Whittaker plots) for ithomiines sampled at all study sites.. .................................................................................................... 36 3-3 Species accumulation curves for Ithomiini at 5 eastern Ecuadorian field sites.. 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