Eueides Hübner 1816

Introduction

Etymology: Euides means shapely, comely (Eueides). From the greek prefixes eu- good , favourable , easy (Lederer, 1967) and  the greek adjectival suffix –eides- eidos that means form (Creisler, 1996).

Characteristics

Early stages: The larvae are similar to Heliconius, except that they are more colourful and feed only on mature leaves.  The larvae are solitary in some species, gregarious in others, and seem to show indications of larval mimicry in some species  (i.e., Eueides vibilia vialis in Costa Rica). The pupae are highly distinctive, with four dorsal spines that are usually spread out into a X shape, and a strong curve to the abdomen that causes suspended pupae to be held horizontally to the substrate (DeVries, 1997) (see each species for more details).

Adults:  The butterflies in this genus are similar to Heliconius but are recognized by the smaller size, a relatively short body, and short antennae (see each species for more details). The colour patterns show mimetic resemblance to tiger-striped species, Heliconius and Actinote, and others seem to form mimicry complexes with Dryas and other Eueides species (DeVries, 1997).

Discussion of Phylogenetic Relationships

Geographical distribution

The genus ranges from Mexico through Central and South America and the West Indies, and most are found in the Amazon  Basin (DeVries, 1997) (see maps attached to each species).

Habits

Eueides species are mostly canopy-flying insects and tend to live in localized populations near the hostplant.

Hostplants: Eueides larvae feed on Passifloraceae and Turneraceae; host plants include vines and trees (Brown, 1981; DeVries, 1997) (see each species for more details).

Other Names for Eueides Hübner 1816

• Mechanitis Illiger 1807 invalid - suppressed (ICZN Op. 232)
• Semelia Doubleday 1845 currently viewed as a subjective junior synonym
• Evides Agassiz 1846 unjustified emendation - junior objective synonym
• Semelia Erichson 1849 invalid - preoccupied
• Semelia Boisduval 1870 invalid - preoccupied

References

Beltrán, M., Jiggins, C. D., Brower, A. V. Z., Bermingham, E. & Mallet, J. 2007 Do pollen feeding, pupal-mating and larval gregariousness have a single origin in Heliconius butterflies? Inferences from multilocus DNA sequence data. Biol. J. Linn. Soc. 92, 221-239.

Brower, A. V. Z. & Egan, M. G. 1997 Cladistics of Heliconius butterflies and relatives (Nymphalidae: Heliconiiti): the phylogenetic position of Eueides based on sequences from mtDNA and a nuclear gene. Proc. R. Soc. Lond. B 264, 969-977.

Brown K. S. 1981 The Biology of Heliconius and Related Genera. Annual Review of Entomology 26, 427-456.

Creisler B. 1996 The Etymology of Chelodina Fitzinger, 1826 (Testudines: Chelidae. Journal of Herpetology, Vol. 30, No. 4 (Dec., 1996), pp. 556-556.

DeVries P. J. 1997 The Butterflies of Costa Rica and Their Natural History, Volume I: Papilionidae, Pieridae, Nymphalidae Princeton University Press, Baskerville, USA.

Eueides. The Main-Word Info page. http://www.wordinfo.info/words/index/info/view_unit/705 [Accessed Agust 16, 2008].

Hübner J. 1816. Verzeichniss bekannter Schmettlinge [sic]. Augsburg, Jacob Hübner. (1): 1-16 (21 September-31 December)

Lederer R. 1967 Shaping the Dystopian Nightmare.The English Journal, Vol. 56, No. 8 (Nov., 1967), pp. 1132-1135.