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Heliconius Timareta
''Heliconius'' comprises a colorful and widespread genus of brush-footed butterflies commonly known as the longwings or heliconians. This genus is distributed throughout the tropical and subtropical regions of the New World, from South America as far north as the southern United States. The larvae of these butterflies eat passion flower vines (Passifloraceae). Adults exhibit bright wing color patterns which signal their distastefulness to potential predators. Brought to the forefront of scientific attention by Victorian naturalists, these butterflies exhibit a striking diversity and mimicry, both amongst themselves and with species in other groups of butterflies and moths. The study of ''Heliconius'' and other groups of mimetic butterflies allowed the English naturalist Henry Walter Bates, following his return from Brazil in 1859, to lend support to Charles Darwin, who had found similar diversity amongst the Galápagos finches. Model for evolutionary study ''Heliconius'' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Heliconius Numata
''Heliconius numata'', the Numata longwing, is a brush-footed butterfly species belonging to the family Nymphalidae, subfamily Heliconiinae. Distribution and habitat This species is native to most of South America, from Venezuela to southern Brazil (Guyana, French Guiana, Surinam, Guatemala, Venezuela, Ecuador, Bolivia, Brazil and Peru). ''H. numata'' is a neotropical species, less common in virgin forest than in areas of secondary growth. It occurs at an elevation of above sea level in tall forests. Subspecies Subspecies include: *''Heliconius numata numata'' (Surinam, French Guiana, Guyana) *''Heliconius numata silvana'' (Stoll, 1781) (Surinam, Guyana, Venezuela, Guatemala, Brazil: Pará, Amazonas) *''Heliconius numata ethra'' (Hübner, 831 (Brazil: Espírito Santo) *''Heliconius numata aristiona'' Hewitson, 853/small> (Bolivia, Peru) *''Heliconius numata aurora'' Bates, 1862 (Brazil: Amazonas, Colombia, Bolivia, Peru) *''Heliconius numata euphone'' C. & R. Felder, 1862 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Müllerian Mimicry
Müllerian mimicry is a natural phenomenon in which two or more well-defended species, often foul-tasting and sharing common predators, have come to mimic each other's honest warning signals, to their mutual benefit. The benefit to Müllerian mimics is that predators only need one unpleasant encounter with one member of a set of Müllerian mimics, and thereafter avoid all similar coloration, whether or not it belongs to the same species as the initial encounter. It is named after the German naturalist Fritz Müller, who first proposed the concept in 1878, supporting his theory with the first mathematical model of frequency-dependent selection, one of the first such models anywhere in biology. Müllerian mimicry was first identified in tropical butterflies that shared colourful wing patterns, but it is found in many groups of insects such as bumblebees, and other animals including poison frogs and coral snakes. The mimicry need not be visual; for example, many snakes share a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
