"Hollow-Face" Mimicry of Vipers in Nepheloleuca?

While I was shooting macro in the Costa Rican tropical forest, I came across a large, ochre-yellow moth perched with its wings half raised. At first, I didn't give it much thought, quickly moving on to the next subject. After reviewing my photos, I noticed what I think may be an unusual form of Batesian mimicry which makes use of the "hollow-face illusion", an effect produced by a concave image when viewed from different angles.

What first struck me was the similarity in color between the Nepheloleuca moth and the abundant eyelash viper (Bothriechis schlegelii), the moth's two ocelli, and markings which appear quite similar to the viper's darkened face banding, pit organs, and upper labial scales. Furthermore, the half raised resting position brought the "flattened" pattern into three dimensions. The effect produced was similar to folding an image of a person or character concavely, bisecting the face and producing the illusion of a convex, three dimensional face which follows the observer. See these examples:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ti8Vul5s-GE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pH9dAbPOR6M

The ability to mimic not only the patterning, but the active gaze of a venomous snake would ostensibly be an effective deterrent for bird or reptile predators. In order to show the similarity in pattern that I noticed in two-dimensional form, I have mirrored some images* of Bothriechis vipers observed in CR ("flattening" their facial structure) and placed them alongside images* of Nepheloleuca moths (also all observed in CR) with their wings held flat (the top left is my photo mirrored), and drew a simplified illustration of the "hollow-face" effect I observed. By lifting its wings halfway, the moth "re-folds" the "flattened" image of the snake into a concave "mask".

AF186864-AF56-4-B68-B9-D0-19972-D0-F5-DDA

D2-D47-A65-42-D7-4-BCE-93-BD-C226-D6772-D33

This may or may not be the evolutionary force responsible for this patterning. This coloration may simply be another example of dead-leaf mimicry, such as this butterfly found only feet away from the Nepheloleuca sp. I observed: https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/154202645 . The distribution of Bothriechis and Nepheloleuca seems to both corroborate and contradict the mimicry hypothesis: while both genera seem to be particularly abundant in and around similar areas of Central America, the range of Nepheloleuca extends to areas in which no Bothriechis species are found. I am not an expert on either of these genera, the evolutionary processes surrounding mimicry, nor the ecology of Central and South America, so any contradicting interpretations or hypotheses on the patterning of Nepheloleuca would be greatly appreciated.

*images are from these observations (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/deed.en ):
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/154279886
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/176092657
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/164743778
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/171889514
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/4731297
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/183439169

Posted on December 28, 2023 09:14 PM by hsug1747 hsug1747

Observations

Photos / Sounds

Observer

hsug1747

Date

April 2, 2023 06:38 PM CST

Comments

Current ranges don't have to fit perfectly, there're mimics left with no venomous/poisonous species they mimicked, your idea looks quite well.

Posted by marina_gorbunova 4 months ago

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