Cogia hiska hester Evans, 1953

Zhang, Jing, Cong, Qian, Shen, Jinhui, Song, Leina & Grishin, Nick V., 2023, Butterfly classification and species discovery using genomics, The Taxonomic Report of the International Lepidoptera Survey 11 (3), pp. 1-94 : 61

Cogia hiska Evans, 1953 (with its subspecies Cogia hippalus hester Evans, 1953 ) is a species distinct from Cogia hippalus (W. H. Edwards, 1882)

Genomic sequencing of Cogia hippalus (W. H. Edwards, 1882) (type locality USA: AZ, Pima Co. Tucson, lectotype sequenced as NVG-15101B12) specimens across the range reveals their partitioning into two clades with genetic differentiation at the species level: Fst / Gmin and COI barcode difference of 0.49/0.004/2.9% (19 bp) ( Fig. 36). Therefore, the two clades represent two distinct species. One clade contains specimens from the northwestern part of the range northeast to South Texas, USA, and south to Oaxaca, Mexico: the nominotypical C. hippalus and its close relative Cogia hippalus peninsularis L. Miller & MacNeill, 1969 (type locality Mexico: Baja California Sur, Arroyo San Bartolo, holotype sequenced as NVG-15095C07). The other clade consists of specimens from the southeastern part of the range from Mexico: Tamaulipas to Venezuela: Cogia hippalus hiska Evans, 1953 (type locality Costa Rica: Puerto Carrillo) and Cogia hippalus hester Evans, 1953 (type locality Venezuela: Merida). Our methods of analysis do not find species-level genetic differences between C. h. hiska and C. h. hester. The names hiska and hester were proposed in the same work issued on the same date. As the first revisers, we stat. nov. is a species and Cogia hiska hester Evans, 1953 , comb. nov. is its subspecies.