The

butterfly Butterflies are insects in the macrolepidopteran clade Rhopalocera from the order Lepidoptera, which also includes moths. Adult butterflies have large, often brightly coloured wings, and conspicuous, fluttering flight. The group comprise ...

subtribe Euptychiina ( Lepidoptera:

Nymphalidae The Nymphalidae are the largest family of butterflies, with more than 6,000 species distributed throughout most of the world. Belonging to the superfamily Papilionoidea, they are usually medium-sized to large butterflies. Most species have a red ...

) is a diverse group within the

tribe The term tribe is used in many different contexts to refer to a category of human social group. The predominant worldwide usage of the term in English is in the discipline of anthropology. This definition is contested, in part due to confli ...

Satyrini The Satyrini is one of the tribes of the subfamily Satyrinae. It includes about 2200 species and is therefore the largest tribe in the subfamily which comprises 2500 species. Distribution Satyrini butterflies have a worldwide distribution, bu ...

, occurring throughout Central and South America, in addition to a few species known from North America. Euptychiina is a predominantly lowland group, with the exception of one Asian taxon '' Palaeonympha opalina'' Butler, 1871 and the

Andean The Andes, Andes Mountains or Andean Mountains (; ) are the longest continental mountain range in the world, forming a continuous highland along the western edge of South America. The range is long, wide (widest between 18°S – 20°S l ...

genus Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms as well as viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus comes above species and below family. In binomial nom ...

'' Forsterinaria'' Gray, 1973. The taxon was erected by Lee Denmar Miller.

Euptychiina

Despite its members being common, this subtribe has been a challenging subject for taxonomic and phylogenetic studies for many years because of their dull coloration, intraspecific variation, lack of clear morphological characters, and morphological homogeneity. However, with the exception of pioneering work by W. Forster and L. D. Miller, the group received little attention from butterfly researchers until recently due to their typically dull brownish coloration. Currently, 50 genera and over 400 described species are recognized within this subtribe, but the group is estimated to contain over 500 species in 70 genera. The current classification of Euptychiina is based on the Lamas checklist, who retained and reorganized many of the genera erected by Forster. Forster described 33 euptychiine genera that are now widely accepted, but since he erected these genera without testing

monophyly In cladistics for a group of organisms, monophyly is the condition of being a clade—that is, a group of taxa composed only of a common ancestor (or more precisely an ancestral population) and all of its lineal descendants. Monophyletic gro ...

and synapomorphies, many of his genera have been recovered as

polyphyletic A polyphyletic group is an assemblage of organisms or other evolving elements that is of mixed evolutionary origin. The term is often applied to groups that share similar features known as homoplasies, which are explained as a result of conver ...

or paraphyletic in recent molecular phylogenetic studies. Euptychiine phylogeny

History of classification

A. Butler was probably the first to propose a systematic classification for many euptychiine taxa, excluding species now in the "'' Taygetis'' clade". In his monograph of '' Euptychia'' (then used as a catch-all genus to include most euptychiine species), Butler divided the genus into seven groups (Division I to VII). Subsequently, Butler proposed an updated classification for the group and recognized 27 "species groups" within ''Euptychia sensu'' Butler (1867). G. Weymer recognized 29 "species group" within ''Euptychia sensu'' Butler, in addition to treating '' Taygetis'' and '' Amphidecta'' in his monograph of

Satyridae The Satyrinae, the satyrines or satyrids, commonly known as the browns, are a subfamily of the Nymphalidae (brush-footed butterflies). They were formerly considered a distinct family, Satyridae. This group contains nearly half of the known dive ...

in the "Macrolepidoptera of the American Faunistic region" by A. Seitz. Based on Weymer (1911)'s classification, Forster (1964) introduced 33 euptychiine genera and his classification is largely retained in Lamas (2004), a work considered as a vital foundation regarding Neotropical butterfly classification. The recent years have seen an explosion of interest in euptychiine systematics, resulting in many changes in generic classification of the group as well as improvement in our understanding of its species diversity. Although the subtribal name was first introduced by L. D. Miller when he treated Euptychiina as a tribal level taxon "Euptychiini", the genus ''Euptychia'' Hübner, 1818 was historically used to place many euptychiine species now no longer classified in that genus, perhaps explaining why the generic name ''Euptychia'' was used in a much broader sense to include many other euptychiine species. Consequently, Forster included this name "''Euptychia''" as part of new generic names he described, a trend also followed when the new generic name '' Atlanteuptychia'' was introduced for '' Euptychia ernestina'' Weymer, 1911. However, other recently described euptychiine genera do not follow this trend (references above).

Biology

There exist detailed early stage biology (i.e. complete life cycle documented) information for 30 euptychiine species.See, J., Nakahara, S., Gallice, G. 2018 Immature stages of ''Splendeuptychia quadrina'' (Butler, 1869) (Lepidoptera: Nymphalidae: Satyrinae)''. Tropical Lepidoptera Research'', 28 (2): 49–53. Larva of euptychiine species often lack body scoli and possessing short head scoli and caudal filaments, but there exist some variation. Hostplant records are known for approximately 100 species, those records are mainly

grass Poaceae () or Gramineae () is a large and nearly ubiquitous family of monocotyledonous flowering plants commonly known as grasses. It includes the cereal grasses, bamboos and the grasses of natural grassland and species cultivated in lawns a ...

and

bamboo Bamboos are a diverse group of evergreen perennial flowering plants making up the subfamily Bambusoideae of the grass family Poaceae. Giant bamboos are the largest members of the grass family. The origin of the word "bamboo" is uncertain, ...

species, although the genus ''Euptychia'' is known to feed on mosses and lycopsids.Brévignon, C. 2008. Inventaire des Satyrinae de Guyane Française (Lepidoptera: Nymphalidae), pp. 62-94. In: Lacomme, D., Manil, L. (Eds.),''Lépidoptères de Guyane, Tome 3, Rhopalocères 2.'' Paris, Lepidopteristes de France.

Generic classification and species accounts (as of February 2019)

References

{{Taxonbar , from=Q3060492 Lepidoptera subtribes