Insects - Pests of Ornamental Trees, Shrubs and Flowers - page 204

Family NEPTICULIDAE

DAMAGE
Infested leaves are unsightly but attacks have little or no
effect on plant growth.

Minute moths with the first antennal segment forming
an 'eye-cap'. The larvae, which feed in leaves and form
sinuous mines or blotches, have a wedge-shaped head
and are virtually apodous, the thoracic legs being
reduced to short, extendible lobes and the abdominal
prolegs to fleshy humps without crotchets. Pupation
usually takes place outside the mine in small,
parchment-like cocoon.

Stigmella hemargyrella (Kollar) ( 478 )
Widely distributed and locally common on beech
( Fagus sylvatica ), the larvae feeding in elongate
galleries formed in the leaves. Infestations are often
discovered on beech hedges, the mines disfiguring the
leaves but not causing significant damage. There are
two generations annually, larvae feeding in June and
from August to September; adults (5-6 mm wingspan,
the fore wings bronzy brown and with a distinct silver
or golden crossband) occur from April to May and from
late July to early August.

Stigmella anomalella (Goeze) ( 477 )
larva

rose leaf miner
A generally common pest of rose ( Rosa ), and often
abundant on both wild and cultivated bushes. Present
throughout Europe.

=

Stigmella lapponica (Wocke) ( 479 )
Generally common on birch ( Betula ), including young
amenity and nursery trees. Adults occur in May, eggs
being laid on the underside of the leaves, usually close
to a major vein. The larvae feed from mid- or late June
onwards, forming long, angular galleries which often
follow but may also cross the leaf veins. Development
is completed in early July, there being normally just one
generation annually. The first quarter of the mine is
filled with greenish frass; there is then an abrupt change
to a central black line of frass which continues
throughout the rest of the gallery. There may be several
mines per leaf, but the leaves are not distorted and shoot
growth is unaffected.

DESCRIPTION
Adult: 5-6 mm wingspan; head orange, often suffused
with dark brown; fore wings mainly greenish bronze to
golden, with a partly coppery tinge, the apical region
purple; hind wings brownish grey. Larva: up to 5 mm
long; yellow, with a brown head.

LIFE HISTORY
Adults occur in May and in August, eggs being
deposited on the underside of leaves, usually close to
the midrib. The larvae form long, contorted mines
which become filled with greenish-grey to blackish
frass; each gallery widens considerably in its later
stages to leave a clear marginal line along both sides of
the central band of frass. Occupied mines occur mainly
in July and October. Fully grown larvae pupate in
brownish or reddish-brown cocoons spun at the base of
a leaf stalk, in the angle between two shoots or on the
surface of a leaf.

Stigmella obliquella (Heinemann) ( 480 )
Widely distributed on narrow-leaved willows, including
ornamentals such as weeping willow ( Salix vitellina var.
pendula ). Larval mines appear as narrow, frass-filled
galleries; these eventually end in a blotch, with frass

477

478

477 Mine of rose leaf miner ( Stigmella anomalella ) on Rosa . 478 Mine of Stigmella hemargyrella in leaf of Fagus .