Identification, Images, & Information
For Insects, Spiders & Their Kin
For the United States & Canada

Genus Phyllonorycter

Micro Moth - Phyllonorycter Gracillariidae, spent pupal case (maple) - Phyllonorycter lucidicostella Red oak blotch mine with larva - Phyllonorycter  Tilia americana host Phyllonoryctor luceteliella? - Phyllonorycter lucetiella St. Andrews leaf miner on Lonicera japonica SA984 2017 4 - Phyllonorycter St. Andrews leaf miner on Quercus alba SA1248 2017 1 - Phyllonorycter Lake Aberdeen leaf miner on Alnus serrulata D2571 2020 1.1 - Phyllonorycter Phyllonorycter rileyella
Show images of: caterpillars · adults · both
Classification
Kingdom Animalia (Animals)
Phylum Arthropoda (Arthropods)
Subphylum Hexapoda (Hexapods)
Class Insecta (Insects)
Order Lepidoptera (Butterflies and Moths)
Superfamily Gracillarioidea (Ribbed Cocoon-maker and Leaf Blotch Miner Moths)
Family Gracillariidae (Leaf Blotch Miner Moths)
Subfamily Lithocolletinae
Genus Phyllonorycter
Numbers
Eighty-one described species are known from America north of Mexico.
Size
Forewing lengths from 2.5-4.5 mm.(1)
Identification
Adult - tiny moths with slender forewings that are held against the body at rest and taper to a rounded point; ground color of forewing orangish in many species but ranges from white through yellow and reddish to brown; often patterned with a thin white basal streak and several white wedges along costa and inner margin that point inward to middle of wing; hindwing reduced to a sharp lance-like midrib from which projects a wide fringe of hair-like scales (see wing illustrations of 49 European species)

Larva - tiny, grub-like, usually whitish or yellow with no markings.

Ova - generally eggs are flat, approximately 0.3 mm in length, 0.2 mm in width, and are lightly cemented to the lower leaf surface.(2)
Range
Much of North America and Eurasia.
Habitat
Various trees and shrubs.
Season
Adults may be present from March to November; individual species often have reduced flight seasons.
Food
Larvae mine the leaves of a wide variety of trees and shrubs but individual species are usually host-specific.
Life Cycle
All species' larvae are believed to possess three early sap-feeding and two later tissue-feeding instars. Sap-feeding instars initiate a slender, serpentine to wedgeshaped, subepidermal tract on the underside of the leaf. The succeeding two instars continue feed in the spongy parenchyma, which, by the third instar, is enlarged to form a blotch (2). Usually two or three generations per year.
Print References
Braun, A. F. 1908. Revision of the North American species of the genus Lithocolletis Hübner. Trans. American Ent. Soc. 34(4): 269-357
Internet References
adult illustration of "typical" Phyllonorycter species (U. of Kentucky)
Works Cited
1.Moths of Western North America
Powell and Opler. 2009. UC Press.
2.Biology and systematics of the North American Phyllonorycter leafminers on Salicaceae, with a synoptic catalog of the Palearctic
Donald R. Davis & Gerfried Deschka. 2001. Smithsonian Contributions to Zoology 14.