Data from: From cryptic to colourful: evolutionary decoupling of larval and adult colour in butterflies

Many animals undergo complete metamorphosis, where larval forms change
abruptly in adulthood. Colour change during ontogeny is common, but there
is little understanding of evolutionary patterns in these changes. Here we
use data on larval and adult colour for 246 butterfly species (61% of all
species in Australia) to test whether the evolution of colour is coupled
between life stages. We show that adults are more variable in colour
across species than caterpillars and that male adult colour has lower
phylogenetic signal. These results suggest that sexual selection is
driving colour diversity in male adult butterflies at a broad scale.
Moreover, colour similarities between species at the larval stage do not
predict colour similarities at the adult stage, indicating that colour
evolution is decoupled between young and adult forms. Most species
transition from cryptic coloration as caterpillars to conspicuous
colouration as adults, but even species with conspicuous caterpillars
change to different conspicuous colours as adults. The use of
high-contrast coloration is correlated with body size in caterpillars but
not adults. Taken together, our results suggest a change in the relative
importance of different selective pressures at different life stages,
resulting in the evolutionary decoupling of coloration through
ontogeny.