Abstract

Molecular phylogenetic studies suggest that similar wing and body patterns in the hawkmoth genus Hyles Hübner, [1819] do not necessarily reflect a close phylogenetic relationship. To improve our understanding of morphological evolution in these organisms, 75 characters derived from the external adult morphology are explicitly coded and analysed in a maximum parsimony cladistic framework. The results corroborate the hypothesis that wing and body patterns have indeed reappeared in different parts of the phylogeny but the underlying genetic mechanism remains to be determined. By reconstructing the suite of ancestral states of the morphological characters using Bayesian inference, we derived an approximation of the appearance of the proto-Hyles species. The overall habitus of this moth does not display a combination of characters found in any extant Hyles species. Rather, the forewings are most like those of members of the Hyles euphorbiae-complex but with better developed antemedial and postmedial lines, the hindwings are typical Hyles, and the abdominal pattern most closely resembles that of Hyles euphorbiarum (Guérin-Méneville & Percheron, 1835), but with one fewer pairs of black subdorsal patches. Within the context of the subtribe Choerocampina and Sphingidae more generally, the proto-Hyles reconstruction does not resemble any other species apart from Rhodafra opheltes (Cramer, 1780), but this appears to be another instance of convergent pattern expression.

Highlights

  • Molecular phylogenetic studies of the genus Hyles Hübner, [1819] (Lepidoptera: Sphingidae) have led to the realisation that similar wing and body patterns in this genus do not necessarily reflect a close phylogenetic relationship (Hundsdoerfer et al 2005, 2009, 2017)

  • The four species have been considered to be closely related, with both H. livornicoides and H. livornica sometimes being treated as subspecies of H. lineata (Rothschild and Jordan 1903) and H. tatsienluica as a junior synonym of H. livornica (Kitching and Cadiou 2000); they have even been placed in their own subgenus, Hundsdoerfer & Kitching: Hyles ancestral and extant morphology

  • The placement of Hyles livornicoides as sister to the Madagascan H. biguttata (Walker, 1856) was not as well supported (65% bootstrap support in the preferred total evidence tree in Hundsdoerfer et al 2009: fig. 3, and 0.72 Bayesian posterior probability and bs below 50% in Hundsdoerfer et al 2017: fig. 2) but no analysis proposed a close relationship with either H. lineata or H. livornica, This latter species, together with its Tibetan endemic sister taxon, H. tatsienluica, groups within the Palearctic Hyles clade

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Summary

Introduction

Molecular phylogenetic studies of the genus Hyles Hübner, [1819] (Lepidoptera: Sphingidae) have led to the realisation that similar wing and body patterns in this genus do not necessarily reflect a close phylogenetic relationship (Hundsdoerfer et al 2005, 2009, 2017). All molecular phylogenetic hypotheses (Hundsdoerfer et al 2005, 2009, 2017) have consistently placed H. lineata as the sister group to all other Hyles with full support. 2) but no analysis proposed a close relationship with either H. lineata or H. livornica, This latter species, together with its Tibetan endemic sister taxon, H. tatsienluica, groups within the Palearctic Hyles clade. In the main alternative pattern, the costal olive green-brown band of the forewing upperside is partially or completely broken up into spots and patches and the veins are never highlighted in white ( they may be highlighted in the beige ground colour, see below), and the upperside of the abdomen has no more than three pairs of subdorsal black spots and the median white line has no small black spots on either side. Hyles nicaea (von Prunner, 1798) (Palaearctic), shows this in its clearest and most contrasting form, but it occurs, with varying degrees of differentiation, in H. annei (Guérin-Méneville, 1839) (South America), H. biguttata (Madagascar), H. calida (Butler, 1881) (Hawaii), H. euphorbiae (Linnaeus, 1758) (Holarctic) and the Central Asian H. centralasiae (Staudinger, 1887), H. salangensis (Ebert, 1969) and H. stroehlei Eitschberger, Danner & Surholt, 1998

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