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INTRODUCTION
The Brazilian Amazon is under the threat of more frequent and intense fires (Aragão & Shimabukuro 2010). Forest clearing and degradation, and severe weather events, such as droughts related to the El Niño Southern Oscillation, increase fire frequency, resulting in negative consequences for habitat integrity and the biodiversity that they contain (Barlow & Peres 2004, 2006; Malhi et al. 2008). A positive feedback arises from more frequent ignition sources from human occupation, longer and drier dry seasons, and the increase of greenhouse gas emissions due to deforestation and related forest fires (Balch et al. 2013, Brando et al. 2014, Cochrane & Barber 2009, Nepstad et al. 2001). Studies show fire disturbance affecting forest structure, increasing tree mortality, depleting canopy cover (Balch et al. 2011) and threatening local biodiversity (Andrade et al. 2014, Mestre et al. 2013, Silveira et al. 2013). This fire dynamic is particularly significant in the south-east of the Brazilian Amazon, an agricultural frontier with intense land-use practices and markedly seasonal climate (Aragão et al. 2014, Shimabukuro et al. 2014, Sombroek 2001).
Although the impacts of fire on faunal diversity are well documented for fire-prone biomes (New 2014), only a few studies have assessed this type of disturbance in humid tropical forests. Surveys in the Brazilian Amazon have shown fire disturbance affecting avian communities (Mestre et al. 2013), fruit production and large vertebrates (Barlow & Peres 2006) and insect communities (Andrade et al. 2011, 2014; Barlow et al. 2012, Silveira et al. 2013). Little is known, however, about the specific effects of the increasing fire frequency associated with ignition sources and severe droughts in seasonal regions of the Brazilian Amazon.
Here, we surveyed fruit-feeding butterflies (Nymphalidae), known to be efficient indicators of forest integrity and diversity of other taxa. Studies show this guild responding to disturbance and environmental gradients (Brito et al. 2014, Filgueiras et al. 2016, Ribeiro & Freitas 2012, Sant'Anna et al. 2014) and correlating with diversity parameters of insects, spiders, vertebrates, lianas and trees (Barlow et al. 2007a, Gardner et al. 2008). They include the subfamilies Biblidinae, Charaxinae, Nymphalinae and Satyrinae, and can comprise up to 75% of all Nymphalidae diversity (Brown 2005). Additionally, they can be...