SD05: Family specific patterns of seasonal abundance and behavior in butterfly communities

Butterfly communities (Order Lepidoptera) can be highly diverse, with species from multiple lineages that differ physiologically and morphologically. As conditions change seasonally in temperate environments, we expect butterfly communities to respond behaviorally, as well as shift in structure as some species become more or less abundant. We examined how changes in abundance and behavior shift throughout the year in relation to abiotic factors and if different butterfly lineages showed taxon-specific patterns. In three prairie field sites in northwest Arkansas, we walked transects, recording butterfly abundance and behavior every other week during the flight period (May to November) in 2018, 2019, and 2020. Using a principal component analysis and generalized linear models, we determined how light environment, temperature, and precipitation covaried with abundance and behavior data recorded for five butterfly families (i.e. Hesperiidae, Lycaenidae, Nymphalidae, Papilionidae, and Pieridae). Overall, the community increased in abundance as temperature and total irradiance increased, and also changed in abundance with changing time of year. Behavior also changed with shifting total irradiance, but did not correlate to changes in time of year or temperature. When families were analyzed individually, only patterns of Nymphalidae and Lycaenidae abundance matched those of overall community abundance. Nymphalidae was the only family whose behavior covaried with the measured environmental conditions. Our results show that the environmental factors that correlate with changes in abundance and behavior overlap, but are not identical. Future studies could determine if family specific physiological responses to environmental conditions explain the patterns we observed.