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Ribbed Cocoon-maker and Leaf Blotch Miner Moths (Gracillarioidea)
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Leaf Blotch Miner Moths (Gracillariidae)
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Porphyrosela minuta - Hodges#0843.1 (Porphyrosela minuta)
Photo#701352
Copyright © 2012
Greg Dodge
Uknown Larvae -
Porphyrosela minuta
Durham, Durham County, North Carolina, USA
September 8, 2012
Size: 1.5mm
Under the white silky coating on the clover leaves there are larvae feeding.
Images of this individual:
tag all
Contributed by
Greg Dodge
on 8 September, 2012 - 12:15pm
Last updated 28 November, 2014 - 9:36am
Moved
Moved from
Porphyrosela
.
I carefully reviewed the Bentancourt & Scatoni paper, and everything here matches their descriptions perfectly. The larvae you photographed are evidently 2nd or 3rd instar, before metamorphosing into the more caterpillar-like later instars which have legs and aren't so flattened. Of course, someone still needs to get specimens to Don Davis in order to properly document the presence of this species in North America.
…
Charley Eiseman
, 28 November, 2014 - 9:36am
Moved
Moved from
Leaf Blotch Miner Moths
.
…
Charley Eiseman
, 19 November, 2012 - 8:42am
Moved
Moved from
Unidentified Leaf Mines
.
…
Charley Eiseman
, 23 September, 2012 - 1:51am
bup? might be something in the Trachyini
Moved from
ID Request
.
…
v belov
, 17 September, 2012 - 11:02am
Unknown Larvae
It's a moth. I just put up five new images 11 days after the larvae were first discovered in the grass and about 8 days after being placed in a plastic vial. Perhaps someone is familiar with this moth.
…
Greg Dodge
, 19 September, 2012 - 1:00pm
Ross Hill's suggestion...
of
Porphyrosela desmodiella
seems reasonable to me, but I don't know much about adult leafminers and we should wait for Terry to weigh in. I do think it's safe to say it's a gracillariid.
P. desmodiella
is recorded from a few different legumes, but is supposed to always make an underside tentiform mine as far as I know, not a flat upperside mine like this. The other day in South Dakota I found mines similar to this in black medick (
Medicago lupulina
), which I mistook for clover at first. I was guessing they were made by a
Parectopa
of some sort, but after seeing this I'm reconsidering. Hope I get an adult out of mine too.
…
Charley Eiseman
, 21 September, 2012 - 6:18pm
says Henry Hespenheide:
"It looks beetle-ish, but I don't know of any taxa/species that use clover as a host.
Desmodium
is the closest bup miner host, and the species that mines that genus has a very different mine (I've reared it in Connecticut). You might contact Dave Wagner at the Univ. of Connecticut -- he's the lep leaf-miner expert. Urge Greg to rear it. That's always the best way to ID an unknown miner."
…
v belov
, 17 September, 2012 - 11:28am
Interesting
I hope you can toss a few of the (unopened) leaf mines into a Ziploc freezer bag and rear them through. My guess is that they are moth larvae (definitely not Diptera, and they look too small to be beetle larvae...but could be). If they are leps, I don't recognize the mine or the larva on this host.
…
Terry Harrison
, 10 September, 2012 - 12:23pm