| | Insects of Britain and Ireland: the genus Phyllonorycter (Lepidoptera-Gracillariidae) |
Associated with herbs. On Leguminosae; Lathyrus, Trifolium, and Vicia (and Medicago?).
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 one pair of hooked processes; cremastal processes long and thin.
Adults. Antennae basally golden, then shining white. Face silvery. Head brown (with a golden sheen). Thorax shining orange, or brown (or greyish). Wing-span 8–9 mm. Forewings pale golden ochreous, or golden brown; not clear shining white; with a well defined basal streak (this straight, traversing about a third of the wing). The basal streak pale; dark-edged above. Forewings with well defined pale strigulae (shining white). Costal strigulae 4. Dorsal strigulae 3. Forewings with the first costal strigula not forming an acute angle with a dorsal one; with one transverse pale fascia, or without transverse pale fasciae (the first pair of strigulae separated by their darkened tips). 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. The forewing basal fringe line confined to the apical region or fading dorsally (short). Hindwing cilia whitish fuscous.
The left and right male genital valvae very dissimilar (the left ovate, the right narrower, both with a short spine near the tip). The left male genital valva not spine-tipped (but with a curved costal-marginal spine short of the tip); (this and the right one) with a single costal-marginal spine 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. The female genitalia obscurely exhibiting a signum on the bursa copulatrix.
Adults abroad April to May, August.
Illustrations. • Phyllonorycter nigrescentella: Jacobs (1945). • Phyllonorycter nigrescentella, with food-plants. Phyllonorycter nigrescentella, with Vicia sepium (Bush Vetch, left). Other host genera are here represented by Trifolium ochroleucon (Sulphur Clover), and Lathyrus pratensis (Meadow Vetchling, right). Plants from Curtis. • P. lantanella , P. junoniella (as vacciniella) and P. nigrescentella (as bremiella): Stainton (1855) Plate IV, under Lithocolletis. PHYLLONORYCTER. 1, P. lantanella: imago (1m), larva (1a) and mined Viburnum lantana leaf (1b). 2, P. junoniella: imago (2m), larva (2a), and mined leaf of Vaccinium vitis-idaea (2b). 3, P. nigrescentella: imago (3a), larva (3a), and mined leaf of Vicia sepium (3b). • Stainton (1855), Plate IV: original legend.. • Phyllonorycter nigrescentella, 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’.
