| | Insects of Britain and Ireland: the genus Phyllonorycter (Lepidoptera-Gracillariidae) |
Associated with shrubs. On Leguminosae; Cytisus.
Larvae. The larvae mining in shoots, or under green bark. Found in August to December, or January to May (hibernating). The larva not constructing a definite cocoon.
Pupa. The pupal cremaster with two pairs of hooked processes; two pairs of cremastal processes very unequal in length (the outer pair smaller and curved outwardly, the inner sharply curved upwards from the dorsum); cremastal processes relatively short and basally broad.
Adults. Antennae silvery white to the base. Face white. Head dark fuscous. Thorax whitish, dusted fuscous; with a conspicuous median pale streak. Wing-span 7–8 mm. Forewings rather dull golden ochreous (liberally dusted with darker brown scales); not clear shining white; with a well defined basal streak (this traversing to near the middle of the wing). The basal streak pale; markedly bent (bending upwards and more or less connecting with the apex of the first costal strigula); not dark-edged above. Forewings with well defined pale strigulae (these white). Costal strigulae 5. Dorsal strigulae 4. Forewings with one transverse pale fascia (the second costal strigula meeting the first dorsal). Forewings without conspicuous dark apical marks. The forewing fringe faintly narrowly dark-lined along the bases of the cilia, or not dark-lined. Hindwing cilia light brownish fuscous.
The left and right male genital valvae similar in size and form to very dissimilar (broadly linear to slightly clavate, the left perhpas slightly larger). The left male genital valva retrorsely tipped by a hooked spine (this preceded costal-marginally by a series of short straight spines). 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 June to July.
Illustrations. • Phyllonorycter scopariella: Jacobs (1945). • Phyllonorycter scopariella, with food-plant. Phyllonorycter scopariella, with its host plant Sarothamnus scoparius (Broom). The plant details from Le Maout and Decaisne. • Phyllonorycter scopariella, 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’.
