Predation favours Bicyclus anynana butterflies with fewer forewing eyespots.

ABSTRACT: There are fewer eyespots on the forewings versus hindwings of nymphalids but the reasons for this uneven distribution remain unclear. One possibility is that, in many butterflies, the hindwing covers part of the ventral forewing at rest and there are fewer forewing sectors to display eyespots (covered eyespots are not continuously visible and are less likely to be under positive selection). A second explanation is that having fewer forewing eyespots confers a selective advantage against predators. We analysed wing overlap at rest in 275 nymphalid species with eyespots and found that many have exposed forewing sectors without eyespots: i.e. wing overlap does not constrain the forewing from having the same number or more eyespots than the hindwing. We performed two predation experiments with

SUBMITTER: Chan IZW 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8150031 | biostudies-literature | 2021 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature