o_19ko2dt161ng2j4e1tgnoqv1s45a.pdf

CHEY VUN KHEN (2007)
Local collections of Lepidoptera are kept mainly in the forest research institutions of Peninsular
Malaysia, Sabah and Sarawak. The Sabah Forest Insect Museum in Sepilok, for example,
houses more than 2,400 species of macromoths with 18,000 pinned specimens. Various other
collections are also maintained by universities and other research institutions. In addition,
there are privately owned collections, such as that of Dato’ Henry Barlow, who keeps an
excellent collection of moths in his residence in Genting Sempah. By and large most of the
collections with type specimens are housed in the major museums in developed countries, for
example, the Natural History Museum in London.
INDICATORS OF BIODIVERSITY
Biodiversity on a global scale is estimated to be about 10 million species, and over 60 % are
insects (Speight et al. 1999). Since the insect fauna is a major proportion of the biodiversity in
a terrestrial ecosystem such as the tropical rain forest, human disturbance such as forest
conversion will have a telling effect on it. The insect group that fulfils most criteria as effective
indicators of changes in biodiversity is moths (Holloway & Stork 1991).
Taxonomy is the foundation of biodiversity, and its importance is underlined when insect
groups are being used as bioindicators. To avoid confusion such as pooling of sibling species,
which would adversely affect data, insect groups with better known taxonomy are preferred.
Compared to other insect groups, moths (especially the macromoths) are the best known
taxonomically after butterflies. Butterflies, however, are fewer in species and less readily
sampled, which makes data analysis more difficult. Moths are easily sampled using a lighttrap
at night and, being more speciose, they provide a larger data set that is easier to analyse.
Compared to vertebrates such as mammals or birds, which are less readily observed or sampled,
moths, for the afore-mentioned reasons, are relatively easily sampled.
In their larval stage, moths and butterflies are mainly phytophagous leaf-feeders (Holloway et
al. 2001; Robinson et al. 2001), but the caterpillars of some species of moths belong to other
guilds such as detrivores of plant and animal material, flower, fruit, and seed predators, stem
borers, lichen and algal browsers, fungal feeders and insectivores (Holloway & Stork 1991).
Some of them are stenotopic species restricted to a certain habitat, some are specialists with
limited ecological tolerance or are host-plant specific, while others are generalists indicative
of disturbed habitat. Moths of the Lophoptera lineage (Noctuidae: Stictopterinae) have
caterpillars that are known to be leaf-feeders of Dipterocarpaceae, and species in this group
are likely to be absent in highly degraded forest sites (Chey 2002). Thus, abundance or absence
of the moths will reflect on the composition of the vegetation in the area being sampled.
Rapid and sensitive response to environmental disturbance is a prerequisite for a bioindicator.
Moths and butterflies generally have short life cycles and respond rapidly to changes in the
environment. Species with limited ecological tolerance can only thrive in an undisturbed forest
environment and will be the first to disappear after human disturbance. Most generalists or r-
strategists, on the other hand, are opportunists distributed over a wide range of ecological
gradients, and they rapidly increase in abundance as a result of disturbance. They particularly
favour early successional stages in ecological regeneration, and many are pests of crops.
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