Species Ogyris caelestia Beaver & Braby, 2023

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• Ogyris caelestia Beaver & Braby, 2023.
  Zoobank Registration Number:urn:lsid:zoobank.org:act:CF5DF1EB-B080-49AA-A386-32CD0D 8EC43A

  Type data:

   Holotype ANIC ♂ (emg. 31 MAR. 2021, M.F. Braby & E.P. Beaver; reared from larva on Lysiana exocarpi ssp. tenuis, coll. 15 FEB. 2021, pupated 14 MAR. 2021; NUOE297449 ANIC DNA sample), 8 km ENE of Leyburn, QLD; 410 m.
  Paratype(s) ANIC 28♂, 28♀, Queensland.

Taxonomic Decision for Synonymy

• Beaver, E.P., Braby, M.F. & Mikheyev, A. 2023. Systematics of the Ogyris aenone (Waterhouse, 1902) complex (Lepidoptera: Lycaenidae): threatened Australian butterflies of national conservation significance. Invertebrate Systematics 37: 457–497

Introduction

Beaver et al. (2023b) revised the systematics of the Ogyris aenone (Waterhouse, 1902) complex through an integrative taxonomic approach based on molecular phylogenetic analysis, morphological examination, life histories and ecology. Mitochondrial sequence data based on concatenated cytochrome oxidase I (COI) and cytochrome b (cytb) (total of 1203 bp) for 36 ingroup samples were generated and combined with sequences available on NCBI GenBank for Ogyris. Phylogenetic analysis inferred by maximum likelihood methods resolved five taxa within this group, with the taxon Ogyris caelestia Beaver & Braby, 2023 described as a new species. This species had previously been confused with O. aenone. The late Jack Macqueen first discovered the species in 1939 near Millmerran but his observations were not published until 25 years later (Macqueen 1965). Prior to the discovery of a second population by J. Macqueen and J.F.R. Kerr at Leyburn in the late 1960s, Macqueen (1965, p. 57) noted the extreme rarity of this species, lamenting that, ‘In spite of much searching and bandaging of suitable trees, only 25 specimens (mainly bred) have been obtained in 25 years of collecting.’ Common and Waterhouse (1972) first drew attention to the remarkable ecological differences between the northern and ‘southern’ populations of O. aenone, and Eastwood and Fraser (1999) noted that O. aenone was an exception to the general trend that obligate ant–butterfly interactions are species-specific.

Distribution

States

Queensland

Extra Distribution Information

Australian Endemic.

Ecological Descriptors

Larva: herbivore (associated flora: Amyema miquelii (Lehm. ex Miq.) Tiegh. [LORANTHACEAE] Box Mistletoe; Amyema linophylla (Fenzl) Tiegh. [LORANTHACEAE] Slender Mistletoe; Lysiana exocarpi (Behr) Tiegh. [LORANTHACEAE] Harlequin Mistletoe).

General References

Beaver, E.P., Braby, M.F. & Mikheyev, A. 2023. Systematics of the Ogyris aenone (Waterhouse, 1902) complex (Lepidoptera: Lycaenidae): threatened Australian butterflies of national conservation significance. Invertebrate Systematics 37: 457–497

Common, I.F.B. & Waterhouse, D.F. 1972. Butterflies of Australia. Sydney : Angus & Robertson xii 498 pp. 41 pls.

Eastwood, R. & Fraser, A.M. 1999. Associations between lycaenid butterflies and ants in Australia. Australian Journal of Ecology 24: 503-537

Macqueen, J. 1965. Notes on Australian Lycaenidae (Lepidoptera). Journal of the Entomological Society of Queensland 4: 56-57

History of changes