Although seasonality in the tropics is often less pronounced than in temperate areas, tropical ecosystems show seasonal dynamics as well. Nevertheless, individual tropical insects' phenological patterns are still poorly understood, especially in the Afrotropics. To fill this gap, we investigated biodiversity patterns of Lepidoptera communities at three rainforest localities in the foothills of Mount Cameroon, West Africa, one of the wettest places in the world. Our multitaxa approach covered six lepidopteran groups (fruit-feeding butterflies and moths, the families Sphingidae, Saturniidae, and Eupterotidae, and the subfamily Arctiinae of Erebidae) with diverse life strategies. We sampled adults of the focal groups in three distinct seasons. Our sampling included standardized bait trapping (80 traps exposed for 10 days per locality and season) and attraction by light (six full nights per locality and season). Altogether, our dataset comprised 20,576 specimens belonging to 559 (morpho)species of the focal groups. The biodiversity of Lepidoptera generally increased in the high-dry season, and either increased (fruit-feeding moths, Arctiinae, Saturniidae) or decreased (butterflies, Sphingidae) in the transition to the wet season in particular groups. Simultaneously, we revealed a strong species turnover of fruit-feeding Lepidoptera and Arctiinae among the seasons, indicating relatively high specialization of these communities for particular seasons. Such temporal specialization can make the local communities of butterflies and moths especially sensitive to the expected seasonal perturbations caused by the global change. Because of the key role of Lepidoptera across trophic levels, such changes in their communities could strengthen this impact on entire tropical ecosystems.

Department of Ecology Faculty of Science Charles University Prague Czech Republic

Department of Zoology and Animal Physiology Faculty of Science University of Buea Buea Cameroon

Faculty of Science University of South Bohemia Ceske Budejovice Czech Republic

Institute of Botany Czech Academy of Sciences Trebon Czech Republic

Institute of Entomology Biology Centre Czech Academy of Sciences Ceske Budejovice Czech Republic

Institute of Silviculture and Forest Protection Faculty of Forestry University of West Hungary Sopron Hungary

Institute of Systematics and Evolution of Animals Polish Academy of Sciences Krakow Poland

Institute of Zoology and Biomedical Research Jagiellonian University Krakow Poland

Nature Education Centre Jagiellonian University Krakow Poland

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