HABITAT USE AND GEOGRAPHIC RANGES OF BUTTERFLIES FROM THE WET LOWLANDS OF COSTA-RICA

In the wet lowlands of Costa Rica, butterfly species with narrow geographic ranges are less able to make use of human-modified environments than are more widely distributed species. The restriction of endemic butterflies to unmodified habitats means that tropical deforestation is most likely to affect endemic species adversely, and that the butterfly faunas of different regions will become increasingly similar as local endemics are exterminated. The biogeographical regions and zones of endemism in Costa Rica, as defined by butterflies, correspond well to those defined by the vegetation, vertebrate distributions, and climatic data. Because of this, effective conservation of the flora and vertebrates will usually serve butterflies well, provided that a scattering of additional, relatively small reserves (probably of the order of several hundred to several thousand hectares) are established within each biological region to conserve patchily distributed insect populations, particularly those occurring in unusual habitats.