Castnia chiriquiensis
Creators: name: Worthy, Robert
name: González, Jorge M.
name: Zilli, Alberto
Publisher: name: Zenodo
Year: 2022
Subjects: Biodiversity
Taxonomy
Animalia
Arthropoda
Insecta
Lepidoptera
Castniidae
Castnia
Castnia chiriquiensis

description: chiriquiensis (Strand, 1913)
(Figs. 11D–E)
“ C. diva […] form chiriquiensis form. nov. ” Strand, 1913, In: Seitz, A. (Ed.), Die Gross-Schmetterlinge der Erde 6: 13, Pl. 6, row d.
Type material: Strand (1913b) wrote “Auffallend ist auch die starke Variabilität in der Grösse; von chiriquiensis liegen mir ♂♂ von 55—90 mm vor (die Type ist 55 mm)” [The variability in size is also remarkable, there are before me ♂♂ of chiriquiensis from 55 to 90 mm (the type is 55 mm)]; this means that the “ holotype ” can be narrowed down thanks to its wingspan of 55 mm, which is very unusual for this taxon. An original specimen with such a wingspan is in MfN and we consider it to be the holotype. In MfN there are also three other males that appear to be those mentioned in the original description, which should therefore be considered as paratypes. The holotype originally had a hand-written label reading “ Chiriqui Trötsch”, a pink “Type” label and a Strand determination label, this can be seen on an old photograph (Gerardo Lamas, pers. comm.), however, it was stolen together with many other types from Berlin some years ago by an unscrupulous dealer. Several years later a collection was given to the museum by the heirs of Ernst Jugl which contained many of the stolen specimens, which it is believed he bought from the dealer in question. Unfortunately, the original labels had been disposed of to hide their provenance. The 55 mm-holotype of chiriquiensis now bears a green determination label like all these specimens, and typed labels with “ Chiriqui ”, “ex coll Ernst Jugl” and “ex coll Staudinger”. A male was found in NHMUK with the data “ Chiriqui ” and a Strand determination label, this may be another paratype, which would demonstrate that the original series was scattered, but there is no way to be sure.
Type locality: Strand (1913b) calls it a form from Chiriquí, so that is the type locality. Chiriquí is the name of a town, a volcano, and a province in south-west Panama.
Taxonomic status: Originally described as a subspecies of diva and treated as such by Miller (1995) and Lamas (1995), this nominal taxon is here synonymised with Castnia diva diva Butler, 1870 (syn. nov.), so it is a junior subjective synonym of that taxon (now in Divana).
Male genitalia: Not available.
Distribution: This taxon is found only in Chiriquí province, Panama. We have seen specimens from Costa Rica referred to as ssp. chiriquiensis, but as we are unable to detect any differences in any of the Central American populations, this is irrelevant (Fig. 16).
Discussion: There is a large series of 19 males and 4 females from Panama in NHMUK, along with 14 males and 8 females from other Central American countries including two syntypes of diva diva, we have also examined 31 males and 8 females from Central America in other collections. We can see no differences between specimens from Chiriquí and those from other Central American countries.
Material examined: 22 males and 4 females from Panama were examined for this study.
description: Published as part of Worthy, Robert, González, Jorge M. & Zilli, Alberto, 2022, A review of the genera Amauta Houlbert, 1918 and Divana J. Y. Miller, 1982 (Lepidoptera: Castniidae) with description of a new genus, pp. 301-342 in Zootaxa 5194 (3) on page 324, DOI: 10.11646/zootaxa.5194.3.1, http://zenodo.org/record/7154442