| | Insects of Britain and Ireland: the genus Phyllonorycter (Lepidoptera-Gracillariidae) |
Synonym: Phyllonorycter spinolella (Duponchel)
Associated with shrubs. On Salicaceae; Salix (mainly Goat Willow?).
Larvae. The larvae mining in leaves; in the under-side. Found in July, or September to October. The larva pupating in a morphologically distinct cocoon.
Pupa. The pupal cremaster with one pair of hooked processes; cremastal processes long and thin (cf. those of P. salicicolella).
Adults. Antennae shining white to the base (proximally, ringed dark grey distally). Face white. Head light fuscous. Thorax brassy brown (edged white). Wing-span 8–10 mm. Forewings golden ochreous; not clear shining white; with a well defined basal streak (this straight, fairly broad, 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 (white). Costal strigulae 4. Dorsal strigulae 3, or 4. Forewings with the first costal strigula not forming an acute angle with a dorsal one; with one transverse pale fascia (via confluence of the first pair of strigulae, which are scarcely recognisable as entities). The fascia only slightly bent. Forewings with conspicuous dark apical marking. Forewing apical marking comprising a round blackish apical spot. The forewing fringe narrowly dark-lined along the bases of the cilia, or not dark-lined (barely discernable). Hindwing cilia light fuscous (slightly brownish tinged).
The left and right male genital valvae very dissimilar (the left ovate, the right narrower). The left male genital valva retrorsely tipped by a hooked spine. The left and right male genital valvae without free costae. The aedeagus long and relatively slender with a triangular barb towards the apex. The female genitalia exhibiting a signum on the bursa copulatrix (tiny).
Adults abroad May and August.
Illustrations. • Phyllonorycter hilarella (as spinolella): Jacobs (1945). • 5 species on Salix in Britain. 1, Phyllonorycter (Lithocolletis) salicolella; 2, P. quinqueguttella; 3, P. hilarella; 4, P. salictella viminiella; 5, P. viminetorum. See notes for legend. • Phyllonorycter hilarella (as spinolella), 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’.
