Leaf-mine: An early gallery filled with greenish frass, later leaving clear margins (British leafminers).

Egg at the underside of the leaf, near a vein. The mine is a clear corridor, often with a hairpin turn, the section before the turn often following the leaf margin. The first section of the mine is entirely filled with greyish green frass. Further on the frass line is quite variable, black, sometimes coiled, always leaving a clear zone at either side. The shift in the frass pattern usually is quite sharp (probably coincides with a moult). The frass is deposited on the ceiling of the mine. Pupation external; exit slit in upper epidermis (Bladmineerders van Europa).

Larva: The larva is bright yellow, head pale brown (British leafminers). The larva is also illustrated in Bladmineerders van Europa.

Pupa: Details unknown.

Adult: The adult is illustrated in UKMoths. The gentialia are not illustrated by the Lepidoptera Dissection Group (check for update).

Hosts in Britain:

Hosts elsewhere:

Time of year - larvae: July, October - December (British leafminers).

Time of year - adults: Two generations, May and August (UKMoths).

Distribution in Great Britain and Ireland: A fairly common species throughout the British Isles (UKMoths) including Anglesey, Ayrshire, Banff, Bedfordshire, Brecon, Caernarvonshire, Cambridgeshire, Carmarthenshire, Cheshire, Derbyshire, East Gloucestershire, East Kent, East Norfolk, East Suffolk, Easterness, Edinburgh, Elgin, Glamorgan, Herefordshire, Hertfordshire, Huntingdonshire, Kincardine,
Leicestershire, Merionethshire, Middlesex, Monmouthshire, North Aberdeen, North Devon, North Ebudes, North Essex, North Hampshire, North Somerset, North-west Yorkshire, Shropshire, South Aberdeen,
South Essex, South Lancaster, South Wiltshire, South-east Yorkshire, South-west Yorkshire, Stafford, Surrey, Warwickshire, West Gloucestershire, West Kent, West Lancaster, West Norfolk, West Suffolk, Westmorland and Worcestershire (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) and the Channel Is. (Karsholt and van Nieukerken in Fauna Europaea). See also British leafminers distribution map.

Also recorded in the Republic of Ireland (Karsholt and van Nieukerken in Fauna Europaea).

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 Albania, Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Canary Is., Corsica, Croatia, Czech Republic, Danish mainland, Estonia, Finland, French mainland, Germany, Hungary, Italian mainland, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Macedonia, Republic of Moldova, Norwegian mainland, Poland, Portuguese mainland, Romania, Russia - East and Northwest, Slovakia, Slovenia, Sweden, Switzerland, The Netherlands, Ukraine and Yugoslavia. Also present in East Palaearctic (Karsholt and van Nieukerken in Fauna Europaea).

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

Parasitoids in Britain and elsewhere: