We designate a neotype for Rhopalosiphum laconaeTaber 1993 and synonymize it with Rhopalosiphum enigmae Hottes and Frison 1931 (Hemiptera: Aphididae) based on geographic, morphological, and molecular evidence. We list 16 new state/province records and provide notes on morphology and natural history for R. enigmae. Additionally, we review and include new ant and parasitoid associates of Rhopalosiphum Koch, 1854 (Hemiptera: Aphididae).

Discerning the biogeography and historical ranges of organisms is important to understanding the processes causing population divergence and speciation. Mountainous regions in North America have contributed to widespread divergence within animals and plants as species become geographically isolated and diverge. Here, we investigate patterns of divergence for six species of walnut-infesting flies in the Rhagoletis suavis species group (Diptera: Tephritidae) in the United States and Mexico based on sequence analysis of mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) encoded Cytochrome Oxidase I and II genes (COI and COII). We resolved the relationship of the newly described species, Rhagoletis ramosae, found in the highlands of Mexico, within the R. suavis species group to test alternate hypotheses of migration and divergence. Bayesian phylogenetic analysis supported a clade in which R. ramosae was most closely related to Rhagoletis zoqui/Rhagoletis completa, found in eastern Mexico. This implies that the Sierra Madre Oriental and not the Sierra Madre Occidental have been a major conduit of migration, isolation, and speciation for walnut flies between Mexico and the United States. Comparisons of mtDNA divergence for R. suavis group flies with the Rhagoletis pomonella and Rhagoletis cingulata species groups suggested that despite current similarities in geographic distributions, these taxa do not share a common biogeographic history, diverging in different regions at different times in the past. Patterns displayed by Rhagoletis flies can be compared to patterns seen in other organisms through the Southwestern and Eastern United States, and Mexico to develop a fuller understanding of the biogeography of these regions of North America.

The nymphalid groundplan (NGP) is an idealized system used to classify and interpret wing pattern elements of butterflies. Nearly a century ago, the principles of the NGP were applied to the wing patterns of higher moths (Macroheterocera). Recent advances in phylogeny and in the comparative morphology of microlepidopteran wing pattern both suggest promise in revisiting the relevance of the NGP to the more conspicuous and derived groups of large Lepidoptera. In the noctuid subfamily Acronictinae, wing patterns include elements corresponding to the central symmetry system, discal (reniform) spot, and parafocal elements of the NGP. Wing patterns in this lineage are also consistent with the ‘uniform wing-margin’ model, which was hypothesized to explain the relationship between wing venation and color pattern, and which has been corroborated in various lineages of microlepidoptera. The uniform wing-margin model does not appear to hold for butterflies, however, and has not previously been evaluated in Macroheterocera. The finding that NGP-like wing patterns in Macroheterocera share features with microlepidoptera is consistent with convergence, i.e., with independent origins of ‘the’ NGP. Furthermore this finding suggests that such superficially similar (not strictly homologous) ‘NGPs’ may have arisen via different mechanisms corresponding to ancestral differences in the relationships between wing patterns wing venation, and can be differentiated on that basis.