The family Sphingidae
Members of the family Sphingidae definitely rank as charismatic megafauna. They are large (2-20 cm wingspans), strikingly sleek in appearance, and hover to insert their long tongues into flowers. As a consequence, sphingid taxonomy is well developed. Nearly 1400 species have been described and it is unlikely that more than another 200 species await description. The known species are placed in three subfamilies and 202 genera. The Macroglossinae are most diverse; the Sphinginae and Smerinthinae less so. Although sphingids occur on all continents, their diversity peaks in South America and Africa.
This family was targeted for barcode analysis, in part, because of the availability of a recent, well-researched Checklist (Kitching and Cadiou 2000). There is no widely available illustrated guide to the family. Sphingidae Mundi (D’Abrera 1974) provides wonderful images of many species, but it is long out of print and ferociously expensive. As a partial substitute, this site now includes images for more than 200 species and coverage will grow as the project advances.
Checklist
Please click here to see the species Checklist for this campaign.
Barcoding Summary
Please click here to see both current barcode coverage, and the image library for this campaign
Campaign Contacts
| Co-Chairs: | Ian Kitching, Jean Haxaire, Thierry Vaglia |
| Campaign Manager: | Rodolphe Rougerie |
| Campaign Participants: | |
| Africa: | Scott Miller (Kenya), Tony Sinclair (Tanzania), Allan Connell (South Africa), Jurate de Prins (Central Africa) |
| Australasia: | Andrew Mitchell, Ted Edwards & Graeme Cocks (Australia), Scott Miller (Papua New Guinea), Shen-Horn Yen (Taiwan) |
| Europe: | Ian Kitching (UK), J-M Cadiou (France), Mauro Mandrioli (Italy), Rodolphe Rougerie (France), Philippe Darge (France), Patrick Basquin (France), Philippe Annoyer (France), MNHN (France), Yves Estradel (France), Jean Haxaire (France), Hermann Schnitzler (Germany), Jean-Michel Bompar (France), Ulf Eitschberger (Germany), Tomas Melichar (Czech Republic) |
| North America: | Paul Hebert & Don Lafontaine (Canada), Thierry Vaglia (Canada), Bill Oehlke (Canada) |
| South and Central America: | Dan Janzen (Costa Rica), John Janovec & Gerardo Lamas(Peru), José Clavijo, Maria Chacin, Oona Delgado & Quintin Arias (Venezuela) |
| DNA Analysis & Database: | Biodiversity Institute of Ontario |