Leonard187 wrote: ↑Tue Dec 03, 2024 12:59 pm it seems really different with its model Atrophaneura hageni, so does it use its white triangles to mimic the white head of A.hageni?

Leonard187 wrote: ↑Tue Dec 03, 2024 12:59 pm my friend has a tailed one also with white triangles which is really interesting, though I think it should also mimic L. coon.

Leonard187 wrote: ↑Tue Dec 03, 2024 12:59 pm Is picture 3 named as f.anura? It is not really seems like a Troides spp.

Chuck wrote: ↑Tue Dec 03, 2024 6:58 pm That’s amazing, two forms within the same population mimicking two different inedibles. What a trip. No wonder people have studied them so intently. Thanks Adam. I’ll leave you alone now.

Chuck wrote: ↑Tue Dec 03, 2024 1:15 pm That is quite amazing. I wonder if one form will prevail, given that one is a mimic and the other (I presume) is not.

Chuck wrote: ↑Tue Dec 03, 2024 1:15 pm Adam, does anyone, including institutions, have a collection to rival yours?

adamcotton wrote: ↑Mon Dec 02, 2024 2:30 pm

Chuck wrote: ↑Mon Dec 02, 2024 1:07 pm I presume these two different forms are genetic, thus parents with tails (for example) will produce offspring with tails. True?

Actually, not necessarily! It would all depend on which 'super-genes' each parent is carrying and whether one is dominant over the other or not. Parents may carry one 'super-gene' on one side of the chromosome and one on the other or they may carry the same 'super-gene' on both sides of the chromosome, so when they mate there can be more than one offspring phenotype.

Adam.

adamcotton wrote: ↑Mon Dec 02, 2024 6:27 pm The white triangle theoretically evolved to mimic Atrophaneura hageni.

adamcotton wrote: ↑Mon Dec 02, 2024 7:19 pm That is a superb specimen, especially for a wild caught female. It should be used for breeding to produce even more white specimens than this.

I did occasionally find specimens with a reduced red triangle at the base of the forewing.

Adam.

bbalukjian wrote: ↑Mon Dec 02, 2024 6:57 pm I study Tahitian mirids)

Leonard187 wrote: ↑Mon Dec 02, 2024 4:20 pm I found that many female individuals of ssp. anceus on Sumatra have white triangles on the base of forewings instead of red ones

Leonard187 wrote: ↑Mon Dec 02, 2024 4:20 pm I have seen a specimen from N. Borneo with very strange phenotype just like a tailless one with tailed pattern on the hindwings (f anura), so what is its model? Might be Troides sp.?

Leonard187 wrote: ↑Mon Dec 02, 2024 4:20 pm do you have some specimen of ssp. eos?

adamcotton wrote: ↑Sun Dec 01, 2024 6:52 pm This photo is interesting, it shows how the mimetic patters become less stable in areas of China where the model species (particularly Atrophaneura for the tailless forms) do not occur.

The white form (bottom row right specimen) occurs occasionally naturally in Mukdaharn, NE Thailand, and rarely further west in Thailand and in Laos. I selectively bred this form, and eventually much whiter than this, from breeding stock I obtained from Phrae, as well as many different forms, some similar to the above, some different.

Basically this shows how the phenotype is very plastic, but is controlled in nature by predator pressure. Birds (and maybe other predators such as lizards) in a local area will avoid attacking those forms that closely resemble any local distasteful species. As a result any other form that may arise tends to be selected out (= gets eaten) and over time stable forms are established that mimic the local models very closely.

Interestingly in most places form butlerianus is rather rare. The genes that control this form are recessive to agenor and distantianus and it is only common where the model for form butlerianus occurs (these are female A. astorion astorion in NE India and female A. astorion varuna in the Malay Peninsula). Interestingly where these models occur the recessive 'super-gene' is so common that 50% or more of females are form butlerianus.

Adam.

adamcotton wrote: ↑Sun Dec 01, 2024 6:28 pm
Yes and yes. As I just posted yesterday, ssp. memnon has a tailed form in Java as well as tailless forms (the same in Bali), but in Borneo the same ssp. only has tailless forms, and they are not identical to those in Java.
Ssp. anceus in Sumatra also has both tailed and tailless forms, but the tailless ones tend to be more common, similarly ssp. eos from Kangean Island, not far from Java can have tailed females, but the various subspecies in the Lesser Sunda Islands east of Bali all only have tailless subspecies.
Subspecies lowii in Palawan is always tailed in both sexes, and interestingly males in Balabac Island (between Borneo and Palawan) range between tailed to tailless and in between.
Subspecies mayo in the Andaman Islands, previously regarded as a separate species, has a tailless male with a distinctive blue hindwing patch, but the female is always tailed, a mimic of the Andaman endemic Losaria rhodifer. There are no tailless forms there, and no tailless models.

Interestingly ssp. memnon was introduced to Ceram and Buru very many years ago (probably on Citrus plants with migrant Javanese), and both tailed and tailless forms still occur there. Luckily they didn't hybridise with the closely related local species Papilio deiphobus.

Adam.

adamcotton wrote: ↑Sat Nov 30, 2024 7:24 pm one is tailless with a black abdomen and a range of different wing patterns very closely associated with these characters depending on the local distasteful Atrophaneura model species (often more than one)
and
the other is tailed with an orange/yellow sided abdomen and the wing pattern mimics the local Pachliopta or Losaria.

These characters are so closely placed on the same chromosomes that 'mixed forms' almost never (extremely rarely) occur - for instance there are only 3 recorded specimens of a tailed form distantianus with a black abdomen.
Clarke, Sheppard & Thornton (1968) investigated the genetics of the then single species and coined the term 'super-gene' for this bundle of characters.
See
https://www.jstor.org/stable/2416804
for the abstract and some further information
and
https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/ ... .1971.0109
for similar information about a subsequent paper by Clarke & Sheppard in 1971.

Chuck wrote: ↑Mon Dec 02, 2024 1:07 pm I presume these two different forms are genetic, thus parents with tails (for example) will produce offspring with tails. True?