The leaf and stem mines of British flies and other insects
 

(Coleoptera, Diptera, Hymenoptera and Lepidoptera)

by Brian Pitkin, Willem Ellis, Colin Plant and Rob Edmunds

 

PIPTANTHUS. Evergreen Laburnum. [Fabaceae]


Piptanthus is not found in the wild in Britain.

One non-Diptera leaf-miner, Leucoptera laburnella, is recorded on Piptanthus in Britain.



Key for the identification of the known mines of British
insects (Diptera and non-Diptera) recorded on Piptanthus


1 > Leaf-miner: An irregular gallery filled with greenish frass, leading to a circular or oval blotch with blackish frass arranged in a spiral fashion. The very first part of the mine is a densely contorted corridor of about 2 mm long, that quickly turns brown. It is followed by a more or less straight corridor of c. 10 mm, entirely filled with greyish green frass. This suddenly widens into a round blotch that during its expansion overruns the earlier corridor and in the end may occupy half of a Laburnum leaflet. The frass, greenish at first, black later, is deposited in the bloth in roughly concentric arcs, glued to the upper epidermis. Pupation external, exit slit in upper epidermis.

On Cytisus, Genista, Laburnum, Lupinus and Piptanthus in Britain and Astragalus, Chamaecytisus, Genista, Laburnum, Laburnocytisus, Lupinus and Petteria elsewhere. Widespread in Britain and continental Euorpe. Also recorded in the Republic of Ireland.

Leucoptera laburnella (Stainton, 1851) [Lepidoptera: Lyonetiidae].




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