| | Insects of Britain and Ireland: the genus Phyllonorycter (Lepidoptera-Gracillariidae) |
Associated with trees. On Fagaceae; native (deciduous) Quercus.
Larvae. The larvae mining in leaves; in the under-side. Found in July, or September to October. The larva not constructing a definite cocoon.
Pupa. The pupal cremaster with two pairs of hooked processes; two pairs of cremastal processes more or less equal in length; cremastal processes long and thin (the processes parallel).
Adults. Face white. Head white, or white and fuscous. Collar light ochreous. Thorax light golden yellow, or brown; with a conspicuous median pale streak (this broad). Wing-span 8–9 mm. Forewings pale shining ochreous, or golden ochreous; not clear shining white; with a well defined basal streak (this traversing about a third of the wing). The basal streak pale; straight, neither markedly long and slender nor sinuate; not dark-edged above. Forewings with well defined pale strigulae (four costal, two dorsal). Costal strigulae 4. Dorsal strigulae 3. Forewings with the first costal strigula approaching a dorsal one at an acute angle; without transverse pale fasciae. Forewings with conspicuous dark apical marking. Forewing apical marking comprising a round blackish apical spot (preceded by indistinct suffusion). The forewing fringe traversed towards the apex by a narrow, curved dark line (fuscous and projecting, from near the last costal strigula); indistinctly narrowly dark-lined along the bases of the cilia, or not dark-lined. Hindwing cilia white to fuscous (or brownish). Posterior tarsi whitish, without dark spots.
Adults abroad May and August.
Illustrations. • Phyllonorycter distentella: Jacobs (1945). • 9 species on deciduous oak. 1, Phyllonorycter (Lithocolletis) roboris; 2, P. harrisella; 3, P. heegeriella; 4, P. messaniella; 5, P. quercifoliella; 6, P. distentella; 7, P. lautella; 8, P. muelleriella; 9, P. kuhlweiniella.
We advise against extracting comparative information from the descriptions. This is much more easily achieved using the DELTA data files or the interactive key, which allows access to the character list, illustrations, full and partial descriptions, diagnostic descriptions, differences and similarities between taxa, lists of taxa exhibiting or lacking specified attributes, and distributions of character states within any set of taxa. See also Guidelines for using data taken from Web publications.
Cite this publication as: ‘Watson, L., and Dallwitz, M.J. 2003 onwards. Insects of Britain and Ireland: the genus Phyllonorycter (Lepidoptera-Gracillariidae) Version: 14th April 2022. delta-intkey.com’.
