More Mining Mumblings

It's seems that I may have the mining bug after all. I've managed to have a quick poke around a few trees lately and keep finding a couple more new mines each time. I'm also sarting to gain a bit more confidence in my ability to identify the mine, once I've managed to identify the plant! All that I've posted on forums for confirmation have been positive so far. Before I post a few more photos of leaves, here's one that I managed to get out from one. It's from the sycamore blister mines I posted last Monday, and so far two of these have emerged from the pupae that were within .....

Phyllonorycter geniculella - mine collected 07/08/2017, adult emerged 14/08/2017

Now for some leaves. I'm still trying to perfect a method of photographing them, but at the moment I'm going with a scanned image of the whole leaf for context, and a back-lit close up of the mine to show the frass/feeding pattern where appropriate. I'm using the USB microscope to check for egg position where necessary, but the photos of that are not that enlightening.

First up, here's a couple more from Market Bosworth CP last Wednesday evening.

Vacated mine on cultivated 'paper-bark birch'. Gallery mine with linear frass pattern conforms to Stigmella confusella.

Vacated blotch mine on alder. The position of the blotch between veins, and the distinct single crease along the center of the mine on the underside confirms to Phyllonorycter rajella. The other mine on this leaf, a folded 'tent' on the edge with larval feeding and frass inside, is possibly Caloptilia falconipennella, but that's a scarce moth in VC55 and I'm not confident enough on that one to record the mine.

And here's a couple from the Ulverscroft Priory area on Saturday ......

Vacated mine on beech. The egg position is on the underside right up against the mid-rib amongst the hairs is absolutely key to this one, and otherwise the gallery mine with dispersed frass (not coiled) is right for Stigmella tityrella.

This vacated gallery mine on lime has the egg on the underside, and the early part of the mine shows the feeding on the underside only. The frass pattern is odd on this one as it fills the mine rather than being linear, but feedback from the leafminers forum agrees that this is Stigmella tiliae.

That's enough part-eaten leaves full of shite for now. Here's a couple from the garden trap to sign off.

Dioryctria abietella

Agriphila geniculea

Hazel

Yesterday evening I had an hour or so to kill in Market Bosworth with Nichola, so we had a wander around the country park. Never been there before but it's quite a big area, and there is plenty of tree diversity so a good chance to have a look for a few leafmines. Of course big tree diversity coupled with botanical ineptitude doesn't necessarily help, but I found a few on leaves that I was confident about at least. I found (I think) three species on hazel .....

First up, here's a couple of leaves and close-ups showing what I think are the vacated mines of Stigmella microtheriella. These are thin gallery mines, with linear frass in the early part of the mine.

I also found loads of these tiny blister mines that were all tenanted. I think these are the very early mines of Phyllonorycter coryli, and the blister will get bigger.

Finally, I found this vacated mine that looks good for Phyllonorycter nicellii.

Upperside

Underside

Whilst poking around the trees, I found this sitting out in the open and easily managed to pot it up for a snap.

Roeslerstammia erxlebella