| | Insects of Britain and Ireland: the genus Phyllonorycter (Lepidoptera-Gracillariidae) |
Synonym: Phyllonorycter acernella (Zeller)
Associated with trees. On Aceraceae; Acer pseudoplatanus.
Larvae. The larvae mining in leaves; in the under-side. Found in July and October.
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.
Adults. Antennae whitish fuscous. Face white. Head white. Thorax white and brown (posteriorly). Wing-span 7–9 mm. Forewings shining white; clear shining white with coloured markings; exhibiting conspicuous transverse dark (black-edged, ochreous) fasciae; without a basal streak; with well defined pale strigulae to lacking well defined pale strigulae (uninterpretable in the usual terms, the wing giving the appearance of golden yellow strigulae and fasciae on a white background). The last fascia straight. The antemedian fascia acutely angulated. Forewings with conspicuous dark apical marking. Forewing apical marking comprising a dark apical strigula ending in a black spot (? - cf. P. acerifoliella). The forewing fringe narrowly dark-lined along the bases of the cilia. The forewing basal fringe line confined to the apical region or fading dorsally. Hindwing cilia light fuscous.
The left and right male genital valvae very dissimilar (the left broadly anteriorly rounded, the right of similar length but linear). The left male genital valva retrorsely tipped by a hooked spine; without marginal spines (but the right having one beyond the middle towards the apex). The left and right male genital valvae without free costae. The aedeagus long and relatively slender with a triangular barb towards the apex.
Adults abroad May and August.
Illustrations. • Phyllonorycter geniculella: Jacobs (1945). • Common British Species on Aceraceae. 1, Phyllonorycter (Lithocolletis) acerifoliella, with its food-plant Acer campestre (Maple, left); 2, P. geniculella, with its food-plant Acer pseudoplatanus (Sycamore, right). P. platanoidella (on the Norway Maple, Acer platanoides: less likely to be encountered) is not illustrated. • Phyllonorycter geniculella (specimen): photo. Phyllonorycter geniculella. 29/7/46, Hampstead Heath. R.G. Warren. • Phyllonorycter geniculella: Ian Kimber (2018), UKmoths https://ukmoths.org.uk/. • Phyllonorycter geniculella, genitalia: Pierce and Metcalfe (1935).
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’.
