Fwd: Re: Chlosyne vs Charidryas

[Chris J. Durden]

>Date: Mon, 26 Mar 2001 08:49:32 -0600
>To: Niklas.Wahlberg at zoologi.su.se
>From: "Chris J. Durden" <drdn at mail.utexas.edu>
>Subject: Re: Chlosyne vs Charidryas
>
>Very interesting. Another, closer look at the morphology seems warranted 
>for the chlosynes.  I have also felt uncomfortable with the contents of 
>*Thessalia*. However *Mellicta* within *Melitaea* seems a stretch unless 
>there are some Asiatic transitional species that bridge the gap.
>...........Chris Durden
>
>At 12:59 PM 3/26/2001 +0200, you wrote:
>>Hi,
>>    My recent work on the molecular phylogeny of the tribe Melitaeini 
>> (see Cladistics 16:347-363), shows that there is something funny going 
>> on in the Chlosyne-group of butterflies. I had 6 species of Charidryas, 
>> 4 species of Thessalia and 5 species of Chlosyne s.s. in the analyses. 
>> The results show that lacinia and californica (both normally considered 
>> Chlosyne) came within Charidryas as the sister clade to gorgone. 
>> Thessalia also did not form a natural group, but theona came out as 
>> sister to the Charidryas/lacinia-californica clade. The three 
>> neotropical Chlosyne I had (janais, gaudealis and narva) formed a 
>> monophyletic group that was sister to all the other Chlosyne-group 
>> species. The bottom line is that most likely the best bet is to use 
>> Chlosyne as the genus for the whole group of species, especially if you 
>> want the genus name to signify that all the species within it have a 
>> common ancestor. The melitaeines are fascinating in this respect, there 
>> are lots of clear groups (such as Charidryas) that turn out to be in the 
>> middle of larger genera, eg Mellicta within Melitaea here in Europe. May 
>> be some day I'll get into those Chlosynes in more detail!
>>
>>Cheers,
>>Niklas



 
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