| | Insects of Britain and Ireland: the genus Phyllonorycter (Lepidoptera-Gracillariidae) |
Associated with shrubs. On Rosaceae; Crataegus.
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 (in the autumn generation, this flimsy, golden-brown), or not constructing a definite cocoon (in the summer generation).
Pupa. The pupal cremaster with two pairs of hooked processes; two pairs of cremastal processes more or less equal in length to very unequal in length (the outer pair stouter); cremastal processes relatively short and basally broad.
Adults. Face white. Head dark fuscous. Collar brown and white. Thorax golden brown and white (anteriorly); with a conspicuous median pale streak. Wing-span 7–8 mm. Forewings fuscous orange (in the male), or brownish orange (in the female); not clear shining white; with a well defined basal streak (this straight, fairly narrow, traversing about a third of the wing). The basal streak pale; straight, neither markedly long and slender nor sinuate; dark-edged above. Forewings with well defined pale strigulae (these white). Costal strigulae 4 (white). Dorsal strigulae 2, or 3–4 (sometimes with one or two obscurely discernable within the fringe line). 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 dark apical strigula. The forewing fringe narrowly dark-lined along the bases of the cilia (well marked, though not very dark). The forewing basal fringe line complete. Hindwing cilia slightly golden fuscous. Posterior tarsi with dark spots.
The left and right male genital valvae similar in size and form (linear, blunt-tipped). The left male genital valva not spine-tipped. The left and right male genital valvae having free costae. The left and right free costae almost completely detached from the valvae; markedly different (the right somewhat longer, almost equalling its valva, both shortly hook-spine-tipped). The aedeagus long and relatively slender with a triangular barb towards the apex. The female genitalia exhibiting a signum on the bursa copulatrix (doule pointed below).
Adults abroad May and August.
Illustrations. • Phyllonorycter oxyacanthae: Jacobs (1945). • Phyllonorycter oxyacanthae and a common food-plant. Phyllonorycter oxyacanthae, with Crataegus monogyna (hawthorn). Also associated with Pyrus (pear) and Cydonia (quince). The plant ilustration from Curtis. • Phyllonorycter oxyacanthae, 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’.
