Subspecies and protection

[Pierre Zagatti]

Dear all,

According to Smith, Miller and Miller (Butterflies of the West Indies and South
Florida, 1994) the only valid subspecies in Central America is D. p. megalippe
(Huebner, 1826), which lives in the Greater Antilles (not in Cuba) and the
Lesser Antilles.
The other described subspecies are based on subjective phenotypic characters and
are still waiting for a strong genetic analysis...

Yes, all monarch populations in the tropics are 'non-migrant'. Nevertheless, in
the Antilles at least, individuals from migrant northern populations are
frequently observed and _probably_ mate with indigeneous butterflies.

There are images of Danaus plexippus megalippe (adults and larva) at :

http://www.inra.fr/Internet/Produits/PAPILLON/papilion/nymphali/texteng/d_plexip.htm

By the way, Danaus cleophile Godart (which name was cited in a previous message)
is a good species, found only in Jamaica and Haiti although it is possibly
extinct in Jamaica and still common in Haiti (due to the huge Papilio homerus,
the butterfly survey of Jamaica is rather good).

Ron Gatrelle wrote :

> >From Ron Gatrelle.
> Dear Jean-Michel,
>     You didn't ask me, but I'd say for now the most accurate classification
> is "subspecies undetermined."  There are a number of things in the Caribbean
> which are descendants of Central American taxa. This is because much of the
> Indies are land masses which broke away from what is now Central America.
> This means that your monarchs may be an undescribed subspecies or a
> "mainland" population of one of the same named entities in the Caribbean.
> Or, as stated by Brown, there may be a sibling species involved somewhere
> here.
>     DeVries (1987) notes that your monarch is morphologically different and
> non- migratory. However, he still calls it "plexippus" which is a taxonomic
> error.
>

--
Pierre ZAGATTI
INRA Unite de Phytopharmacie et Mediateurs Chimiques
78026 Versailles Cedex
FRANCE
Tel: (33) 1 30 83 31 18
e-mail zagatti at versailles.inra.fr
http://www.jouy.inra.fr/papillon/
http://www.jouy.inra.fr/papillon/arct_guy/arct_guy.htm