Catasticta rochereaui Le Cerf, 1924

Bollino, Maurizio & Costa, Mauro, 2007, An illustrated annotated check-list of the species of Catasticta (s. l.) Butler (Lepidoptera: Pieridae) of Venezuela, Zootaxa 1469, pp. 1-42 : 14-16

19 Catasticta rochereaui Le Cerf, 1924 stat rev. (TL: Colombia, Pamplona)

(fig. 11: d-f; fig. 30)

In collections we found one female (collected at El Azul, vía El Reposo, El Tamá, Táchira, at an elevation of 2200 m.) that we preliminarily identified as Catasticta cinerea rochereaui Le Cerf , and one male (collected at Mata Mula, El Tamá, Táchira, at an elevation of 2000 m.) that appeared to be Catasticta cinerea hollandi Avinoff. Field work yielded another male and two females, which were practically identical to the previously known material. These specimens were found in the same area, at elevations ranging from 2300 to 2600 m, and are partially sympatric with Catasticta cinerea suprema . The similarity of the ventral wing pattern of these specimens, which is different from the wing pattern of the sympatric C. cinerea , led us to the conclusion that those males and females belong to the same taxon, which is distinct from C. cinerea .

Catasticta rochereaui was described from a single female, and the male has been unknown. Similarly, Catasticta hollandi was known only from males. We recognize Catasticta rochereaui Le Cerf stat. rev. as a distinct species and transfer the taxon hollandi Avinoff, 1926 (TL: Colombia, Santander, Peña Blanca) to the Catasticta rochereaui species group.

Since Venezuelan males of C. rochereaui differ from the holotype of hollandi , we tried to ascertain its type locality before deciding its subspecific status. Avinoff (1926) provided only the data present on the label: Peña Blanca, Santander, Colombia, Feb. 1917. The type specimen of C. hollandi was collected by Melbourne Armstrong Carriker during his Colombian Santander-Casanare ornithological expedition (1916–1917). Carriker was an American ornithologist who lived for a long time in Colombia selling bird skins to the Carnegie Museum (where the holotype of C. hollandi is deposited), and his biography ( Carriker, 2001) was written by his eldest son. We asked the ornithological staff of the Carnegie Museum if they might be able to supply any further information on the possible location of the collecting site Peña Blanca. Robin K. Panza (Section of Birds, Carnegie Museum of Natural History, Pittsburgh, USA) kindly responded with the following notes: In the "Ornithological Gazetteer of Colombia " (2nd. edition, 1997, by Raymond A. Paynter, Jr.), this locality (Peña Blanca) is given as:

ca. 06:33/72:30 (de Schauensee, 1948a:319)

2,800 m. on western slope of Eastern Andes, a valley SW of Chiscas [06:33/72:29], northern Boyacá, near border of Santander (de Schauensee, 1948a:319); not shown on our maps; Carriker, 24–28 Feb., 1–3, 5 –6 Mar. 1917 (WFVZ, as Peña Blanca, Santander; Todd, 1919:113, as Peña Blanca, Santander; CM, as Peña Blanca, Santander); see El Cardón for discussion of probable error in coordinates for Peña Blanca.

The entry for El Cardón, Santander is:

3,300 m pass above Peña Blanca [ca. 06:33/72:30 (de Schauensee 1948a:319)], Carriker, 5 Mar 1917 (de Schauensee, 1948a:291; CM, as "El Cardón, Boyacá); there are two places with the same name in the general area, vsz. at ca. 06:08/72:32, on the western slope in Boyacá (Atlas, 1977) and the one on the eastern slope in Casanare, on the Rio Chinivaque [ca. 06:09/72:20 (Atlas, 1977)], 8 km NNW of La Salina [06:06/72:20 (USBGN)] (Atlas, 1977); however, both Todd (1942, Ann. Carnegie Mus., 29:366) and de Schauensee closely associate Peña Blanca with El Cardón and the coordinates given by de Schauensee for Peña Blanca indicate it is quite some distance from either of these sites; the locality may actually be Alto Cardón [coordinates?], SE of Carcasí [06:42/72:35 (USBGN)], Santander (Dicc Geog.)

Todd was the curator here when we received specimens from Carriker, and he consulted with Carriker about his collecting localities.

Here are the collecting localities we have from Carriker for February and March of 1917:

FEB 07–17 LA PICA

FEB 24 - MAR 0 3 PEÑA BLANCA

MAR 0 5 EL CARDÓN

MAR 05–06 PEÑA BLANCA

MAR 13–20 LAGUNILLAS

MAR 24 EL COCUY (7 KM S, 10 KM E; PEÑA NEGRA) MAR 26–30 RIO NEGRO

MAR 31 CHINIVAQUE

MAR 31 RIO NEGRO

Carriker was very careful about the accuracy of his data. Therefore, Peña Blanca and El Cardón must be near each other, probably on or very close to the Santander/Boyacá border, as he collected in both locations on 5 March.

Peña Blanca is located on the southwestern side of Sierra Nevada del Cocuy. Due to the different geographical distributions of C. rochereaui and C. hollandi , which is correlated with differences in the width of the white discal band of DHW in males, we retain the latter as a distinct subspecies. Furthermore, we consider Catasticta cinerea laurentina ( Eitschberger & Racheli, 1998) as conspecific with rochereaui (character evidence below), and summarize our conclusions as follows:

Catasticta rochereaui rochereaui Le Cerf, 1924 stat. rev. (TL: Colombia, Pamplona [Norde de Santander])

Distribution: both Colombian and Venezuelan sides of Serranía de El Tamá.

Catasticta rochereaui hollandi Avinoff, 1926 comb. nov. (TL: Peña Blanca, “Santander” [Boyacá], Colombia)

Distribution: Sierra Nevada del Cocuy (Boyacá, Colombia)

Catasticta rochereaui laurentina ( Eitschberger & Racheli, 1998) comb. nov. (TL: Colombia, Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, San Lorenzo)

Distribution: As far as we know, this subspecies is restricted to the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta ( Colombia), but its occurrence in the Sierra de Perijá cannot be discarded a priori. Wojtusiak & Rey (1999) point out that “most cloud forest and Páramo species found in the Tamá have their relatives in the eastern Cordillera [of Colombia], particularly the Cocuy area, and in the Perijá range”.

Males of Catasticta rochereaui can be differentiated from males of C. cinerea by the white discal bands on both DFW and DHW. Females of C. rochereaui , apart from being much larger, can be easily differentiated from females of C. cinerea by the large yellow anal area on DHW, while in C. cinerea the same area is dark brown with, at most, a few yellow scales.