| | Insects of Britain and Ireland: the genus Phyllonorycter (Lepidoptera-Gracillariidae) |
Associated with shrubs. On Leguminosae; Ulex.
Larvae. The larvae mining in shoots, or under green bark. Found in July 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 small, more or less equal in length.
Adults. Antennae greyish white, ringed grey. Face white. Head orange and fuscous. Thorax pale coppery brown, or yellow; with a conspicuous median pale streak, or without a median pale streak. Wing-span 6–8 mm. Forewings bright, shining golden ochreous; not clear shining white; with a well defined basal streak (this fairly straight, narrow, reaching almost to the middle). The basal streak pale; straight, neither markedly long and slender nor sinuate; not dark-edged above. Forewings with well defined pale strigulae (these silvery white, none dark-edged). Costal strigulae 4. Dorsal strigulae 3. 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 indistinctly narrowly dark-lined along the bases of the cilia, or not dark-lined. The forewing basal fringe line complete, or confined to the apical region or fading dorsally (complete around the apex). Hindwing cilia white to fuscous (whitish-fuscous, slightly golden).
The left and right male genital valvae very dissimilar (the left fairly broadly oblong, with a short curved terminal spine, the right narrower with a small spine short of the apex). 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 (double pointed).
Adults abroad June to July.
Illustrations. • Phyllonorycter ulicicolella: Jacobs (1945). • Phyllonorycter ulicicolella and food-plant. Phyllonorycter ulicicolella, with its food-plant (Ulex europaeus, Gorse or Furze). The plant from Curtis. • Phyllonorycter ulicicolella, 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’.
