Photography
We photographed two species of Neotropical poison frog (Ameerega bilinguis and Epipedobates tricolor “Cielito” morph, Dendrobatidae) and five species of Neotropical aposematic butterfly (Eueides isabella , Heliconius atthis , H. erato ,H. ismenius , and two subspecies of H. melpomene , Nymphalidae). The frogs (A. bilinguis = 5; E. tricolor = 4) were photographed at the WIKIRI Selva Viva / Centro Jambatu (Quito, Ecuador) and the butterflies (E. isabella = 4, H. atthis = 2, H. erato = 2, H. ismenius = 2, H. melpomene aglaope = 2, H. melpomene plessen = 2) were photographed at the Mariposas de Mindo – Butterfly Garden (Mindo, Ecuador). We also refer to recently published data on a UV reflective population of O. sylvatica (“Lita” morph), that was photographed in the wild (Yeager and Barnett 2020).
To capture reflectance values across an ecologically relevant spectrum, we took calibrated photographs in both human visible (VIS = ~400-700 nm) and ultraviolet wavelengths (UV = ~300-400 nm), following methods outlined in Yeager and Barnett (2020). In short, we took all digital images using a tripod mounted, UV-sensitive, full spectrum quartz converted Canon EOS 7D that was combined with a metal body NIKKOR EL 80 mm lens. For human-visible spectra we fitted the lens with a Baader UV-IR blocking filter (allowing transmission of 420-680 nm), and for the UV photographs we fitted a Baader UV pass filter (allowing transmission of 320-380 nm). We photographed each subject in both human visible and UV wavelengths, under natural downwelling illumination that was representative of the covered canopy forests where both butterflies and frogs occur. All images were saved in RAW format and included a 10% and a 77% reflectance standard that allowed for color calibration and scaling.