Mines of Phytomyza spinaciae on Cirsium arvense Image: Willem Ellis (Bladmineerders van Europa)

Leaf-mine: Long narrow interparenchymal mine, greenish. Pupation in leaf at end of mine (Spencer, 1976: 503 (fig. 880)).

Unusually long, interparenchymatous, therefore yellowish corridor that remains of equal width throughout its length. (In some plants with thin leaves, like Cirsium oleraceum the mines are not interparechymatous but either full-depth or alternating upper- and lower-surface). The mine makes few curves, and hardly any u-turn, causing the mine to usually occupy the entire length of a leaf. Frass in two rows of grains along the sides. Pupation within the mine, in a lower-surface pupal chamber; the anterior spiracles penetrate the epidermis (Bladmineerders van Europa).

Larva: The larva is described by de Meijere (1928) and illustrated in (Bladmineerders van Europa).

Puparium: White; posterior spiracles each with 18-20 minute bulbs on small conical protuberance (Spencer, 1976: 503). The puparium is illustrated in Bladmineerders van Europa.

Comments: All British records require confirmation.

Hosts in Britain:

Hosts elsewhere:

Time of year - mines: July, October.

Time of year - adults: Unknown.

Distribution in Great Britain and Ireland: Warwickshire (Coventry) (Robbins, 1991: 121); Cambridgeshire and Stafford (NBN Gateway - N.B. includes Watsonian Vice Counties having publicly available records that fall within or overlap the vice county border at 10km resolution or better i.e. a record for a vice county may relate to an adjacent vice county - for included datasets see NBN Grid map below).

Also recorded on Meadow Thistle (Cirsium dissectum), 13.6.1985 at Lough Corrib, Co. Galway, Ireland (H.C.J. Godfray).

NBN Grid map: Note that not all datasets on the NBN Gateway may be available on the map below. If you are an NBN Gateway registered user you can request access for missing datasets via the link 'Open interactive map in new window' below.

Distribution elsewhere: Widespread in continental Europe including Belgium (Scheirs et al., 1994; Scheirs, de Bruyn and von Tschirnhaus, 1996), Denmark, Finland, Norway, Sweden (Spencer, 1976: 503), The Netherlands (Bladmineerders van Europa), Germany (Spencer, 1976: 578), Czech Slovakia, French mainland, Latvia, Lithuania and Spanish mainland (Martinez in Fauna Europaea).

Range extending to the Kirghiz Republic of the [former] U.S.S.R. (Spencer, 1976: 503).

NBN interactive distribution map(s) of known host species in Great Britain and Ireland and elsewhere:

Parasitoids in Britain and elsewhere:

Biodiversity Heritage Library
Bladmineerders van Europa
British leafminers
Encyclopedia of Life
Fauna Europaea [127871]
NBN Gateway