Sunday 24 September 2017

New mines and a potential Small Eggar web

A quick walk at Dingestow this morning (24/9) produced three surprises.  First I noticed a mine of Bedellia somnulentella on Bindweed - only the 5th county record - a distinctive mine that others should be on the lookout for.  The larva eats windows out of the leaf from below, and one can usually find frass caught up in a faint web underneath the leaf.
 


 
Next I spotted the circular mines of Leucoptera malifoliella in a hedgerow Pear - the second county record and a new species for Dingestow.


Finally, an old larval web in a hedgerow Hawthorn caught my eye.  This had really dense silk and was full of frass, but the only larval remains I could find were very shrivelled and old.  I think/hope this could be Small Eggar, following on from George's discovery of a web of this species a few miles away in early summer.  Are the long pale hairs on the larvae and the density of the web sufficient for ID?

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1 comment:

  1. sambbryo25 September 2017 at 13:21

    I collected some dead larvae/shed skins from George's Jingle Street nest of Small Eggar and have them in front of me along with the Dingestow larvae. They are identical! A nice addition to the Dingestow list.

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