Lepidoptera is the second largest order of insects. Encompassing moths and butterflies, it is regarded as one of the most important components of biodiversity. Here, an updated comprehensive overview of Lepidoptera recorded in Ethiopia is presented, composed of 2,438 taxa in 48 families, of which 664 are endemic. Records were compiled from various literature sources and website databases. Although still being far from complete, this review provides important baseline data for understanding zoogeographic patterns and thus for undertaking effective conservation action. Further research on Ethiopian Lepidoptera is encouraged.

Africa, butterflies, checklist, DNA barcoding, endemic, Ethiopian moths

Ethiopia is among the largest countries in the African continent, located in the horn of Africa, covering a total area of 1,127,127 km² (Gordon and Carillet 2003; EBI 2015; Tesfu et al. 2018). It belongs to the Afro-tropical Region (former Ethiopian Region) and, based on the bioclimatic classification of Burgess et al. (2004), comprises the zones “Sahelian Savanna”, “Somalian Xeric Bushland and Shrubland” and “Ethiopian Montane forest and Alpine Moorland” (Hacker 2019). The country’s topography is very diverse, with 20 mountains peaks above 4,000 meters. The highest mountain, Ras Dashen, peaks 4,620 m above sea-level, the fourth-highest in Africa, whilst the third-lowest point in Africa, the Danakil Depression, reaches down to 125 m below sea level. The dominating topographic element is the vast and fertile central highland that accounts for 37% of the land area of the country with an average elevation from 1,500 to 2,400 m that deserved the country to be known as ‘roof of Africa’. It is the largest block of land above 1,500 m in Africa (Clausnitzer and Dijkstra 2005), dissected by the Great Rift Valley and surrounded by lowlands along the periphery (Gordon and Carillet 2003). The mean annual rainfall ranges from 500 mm to 2,800 mm and the mean annual temperatures range from around 10° to above 30 °C. Because of these diverging abiotic parameters, the country is endowed with an amazingly diversity of plant, animal and microbial organisms (EBI 2015). According to Clausnitzer (2014), the rate of endemism in Ethiopia’s flora and fauna is exceptionally high as a result of vast highlands being isolated by the surrounding dry lowlands. Only the most eurytopic and mobile species (usually those of the lowlands) tend to be found in both Ethiopia and the rest of tropical Africa. In the same manner, Kravchenko et al. (2007) stated that the territory of Ethiopia hosts an extraordinarily diverse landscape including high mountains, lowlands, deserts and tropical rain forests that resulted in a hyperdiverse fauna and flora. Likewise, in consequence of its rich biodiversity, Ethiopia is acknowledged as one of the 20-mega-biodiverse countries in the world (Mittermeier et al. 2011; Tesfu et al. 2018).

Lepidoptera represent the second largest insect order, which consists of approximately 140 different families and 160,000 species that have been described and recognised worldwide, so far (Biodiversity Institute of Ontario 2006; Kristensen et al. 2007; Nieukerken et al. 2011). Lepidoptera comprise nearly 17% of all insect species, and some recent estimates suggest that the real number of Lepidoptera species would set up to 500,000 species (Brandao et al. 2009).

The aims of this paper are to give an updated comprehensive presentation of the actual knowledge of Ethiopian Lepidoptera and to provide some estimates for the expected biodiversity of this major insect order in the country.

The present review is based on all pertinent published scientific papers. In addition, records from up to date and relevant online databases were also included, particularly, records from the Natural History Museum of London website (“NHMUK”: Beccaloni et al. 2003), the Barcode of Life Data Systems (“BOLD”: Ratnasingham and Hebert 2007), the African moth website (Goff 2008), LepiMap (Navarro 2007), the African Butterfly Database (Sáfián et al. 2009), the Afromoth website (De Prins and De Prins 2019) and the Afrotropical Butterflies and Skippers digital encyclopaedia (Williams 2018). In all cases, records were included only when sample identifications were made at specific (or subspecific) level, and the provenience from Ethiopia was clearly indicated. Data from entomological collections but not publicly accessible were not considered.

We followed the classification system and nomenclature (valid names and synonymies) used in De Prins and De Prins (2019) with some updates coming from more recent publications. For Rhopalocera, the Afrotropical Butterflies and Skippers digital encyclopaedia (Williams 2018) served as reference. These two outstanding references have also represented the fundamental database and resource for our compilation of the lepidopteran fauna of Ethiopia.

Many entomologists have contributed to our current knowledge of the Ethiopian Lepidoptera fauna. The following selection provides the most significant contributions made by past pioneers and current explorers.

Johann Christoph Friedrich Klug in 1829 was the first to mention Abyssinia, the former name of Ethiopia, in the description of a new Lepidoptera species, the butterfly Pontia eupompe (Klug, 1829) now Colotis danae ssp. eupompe (Nazari et al. 2011), indicating as locus typicus “in Arabia deserta, in Sinai monte, in Dongala et Habessinia”.

From the mid-nineteenth century, additional descriptions came from few authors such as Félix Edouard Guérin-Méneville (1849), Louis Reiche (1850), and Hippolyte Lucas (1852). However, the most significant advance in the nineteenth century was made by the French entomologist Achille Guenée, who published various contributions between 1852 and 1858. He described 31 new species belonging to the Noctuoidea and Geometroidea, based on material collected mainly by Georg Wilhelm Schimper in 1850. In all cases, the locus typicus was indicated as “Abyssinia” (Guénée 1852).

Other important contributions to the study of Ethiopian Lepidoptera were made subsquently, many of which have reported the description of new species from specimens collected in the country. For instance, George Hampson described 23 species from different families in the period between 1896 and 1930 (Hampson 1896, 1898, 1899, 1905, 1909, 1910, 1913, 1916, 1918, 1919, 1926, 1930). Edward Meyrick firstly reported Microlepidoptera from the country, with 40 new species, from the material collected during the expeditions carried out by Hugh Scott and Omer-Coper in 1926–1927 (Meyrick 1932). The most important contribution to the study of butteflies was made by Lionel Walter Rothschild and Karl Jordan, during the first decades of the twentieth century, with 34 new taxa (Rothschild 1902, 1926; Rothschild and Jordan 1900, 1903, 1905). Debauche (1937) reported 42 geometrid species from Ethiopia with eight new descriptions. Likewise, Emilio Berio published many papers dedicated to the Erebidae and Noctuidae of East Africa, describing from Ethiopia 12 and 37 species, respectively (Berio 1939a, 1940a, 1943, 1944, 1945, 1947, 1954, 1962, 1975, 1977), some of them from the localities of Adu-Abuna and Metema, at that time part of Eritrea, but now in Tigray, Northern Ethiopia (Berio 1937, 1939b, 1939c, 1940b, 1973, 1976). Pierre-Claude Rougeot has explored the country several times in 1970s and described 55 new species belonging to various families (Rougeot 1974, 1975, 1977, 1984, Plantrou and Rougeot 1979; Laporte and Rougeot 1981; Rougeot and Laporte 1983). The two French entomologists Bernard Laporte and Claude Herbulot in their publications described from Ethiopia 137 new noctuid (specifically, eight species of Erebidae, two species of Nolidae, and 127 Noctuidae) and 22 new geometrid taxa, respectively (Herbulot 1983, 1993, 2002; Laporte 1974, 1975, 1976, 1978; Rougeot 1977, 1984; Laporte and Rougeot 1981; Rougeot and Laporte 1983; Rougeot et al. 1991).

With the new millennium, the country has awakened a renewed interest from entomologists, which led to the description of 255 new taxa in 18 years. In particular, major contributions to Ethiopian Lepidoptera were made by Hermann H. Hacker, with various colleagues, for Erebidae, Nolidae and Noctuidae (178 new taxa); David Agassiz for Yponomeutidae (five new taxa); Jósef Razowski and Pasquale Trematerra for Tortricidae (34 new taxa described); Axel Hausmann, Andrea Sciarretta and Francesco Parisi for Geometridae (27 new taxa); Ulf Eitschberger and Tomas Melichar for Sphingidae, with eleven new taxa (Hacker and Fibiger 2007; Hacker and Zilli 2007; Haxaire and Melichar 2008; Hausmann et al. 2014, 2016; Hacker et al. 2008, 2012; Razowski and Trematerra 2010, 2012; Hacker and Mey 2010; Hacker 2011, 2013, 2014, 2016, 2019; Eitschberger and Ströhle 2011; Melichar and Řezáč 2015; Eitschberger and Melichar 2016 Melichar et al. 2016; Razowski et al. 2018; Agassiz 2019).

Many of these and other minor contributions resulted from dedicated expeditions, such as the “Joint Ethiopian-Russian Biological Expedition” lead by Vasiliy Kravchenko from Tel Aviv University, Israel; the “Ethiopian Insects Project”, between the Ethiopian Wildlife Conservation Authority (EWCA), the Bavarian State Collection of Zoology (ZSM) and the Museum Thomas Witt (MWM) in Munich, Germany; the projects carried out by the Italian entomologists of the University of Molise with EWCA and Ethiopian Biodiversity Institute (Kravchenko et al. 2007; Sciarretta et al. 2014; Hausmann et al. 2016).

Based on the results of our current review, 2,438 Lepidoptera taxa (species or subspecies) are known to occur in Ethiopia hitherto, belonging to 48 families (Table 1; full list at: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.3234617). This number includes 170 taxa which are not reported by the scientific literature but have been extracted from the above-mentioned websites.

In particular, 929 species or subspecies were described from type specimens collected in Ethiopia, 131 of them, mostly butterflies, at subspecific level (Table 2). It is interesting to note that endemic taxa number 664, approximately 27% of the total Lepidoptera. This high number can be explained by the particular physical and biogeographical history of the country and a broad range of different ecosystems with great diversity of habitats.

Figures 1–6. 

1 Acraea oscari Rothschild, 1902 2 Epiphora fournierae (Le Moult, 1945) 3 Pingasa pallidata (De Joannis, 1913) 4 Odontopera protecta Herbulot, 1983 5 Metarctia flavivena Hampson, 1901 6 Stoermeriana laportei (Rougeot, 1977). Photos credit: Alenuccio Palladino (1); Francesco Parisi (2); Dirk Stadie (3–6).