Phyllonorycter mariaeella
Creators: name: Eiseman, Charles S.
name: Davis, Donald R.
Publisher: name: Zenodo
Year: 2020
Subjects: Biodiversity
Taxonomy
Animalia
Arthropoda
Insecta
Lepidoptera
Gracillariidae
Phyllonorycter
Phyllonorycter mariaeella

description: Phyllonorycter mariaeella (Chambers, 1875) (Figs. 53–67)
L.[ithocolletis] Mariaeella Chambers 1875c: 99
L.[ithocolletis] Affinis Frey & Boll 1876: 222; new synonymy
Cameraria affinis Davis 1983: 10
Phyllonorycter affinis Maier & Davis 1989: 9
Leaf mine. The larva forms an underside tentiform mine in which the frass is collected in a loose mass toward one end, pupating in a flat, oblong, translucent white cocoon. The pupa may be thrust through either the upper or the lower epidermis when the adult emerges (Figs. 53–55, 62).
Generic placement. Braun (1908) correctly included Lithocolletis affinis in her Group I, but Davis (1983) placed it in Cameraria and others have followed suit (Covell 1999; Pohl et al. 2018; De Prins & De Prins 2019), with the exception of Maier & Davis (1989) who listed it as Phyllonorycter affinis without comment. The leaf mine (Figs. 53–55, 62) is clearly consistent with Phyllonorycter and not Cameraria; adult characters are also unambiguous, including the proximally dark-margined white forewing markings (Figs. 56, 63–67) and the absence of setae on the tegumen (Fig. 57).
Hosts. Caprifoliaceae: Lonicera sp., L. ×bella Zabel, L. japonica Thunb., L. maackii (Rupr.) Maxim., L. reticulata Raf., L. sempervirens L., L. tatarica L., Symphoricarpos sp., S. orbiculatus Moench, Triosteum sp., T. angustifolium L.
Distribution. Canada: NS, ON, QC; USA: CT, IL, KY, MI, MO, NC, NY, TX, UT.
Review. Chambers (1875c) described Lithocolletis mariaeella from three specimens reared by M.E. Murtfeldt from underside tentiform mines on “ Symphoricarpus vulgaris ” (= S. orbiculatus) in Kirkwood, Missouri. Nothing further has been published about the biology of this species, but it has been reported from Michigan (Nielsen 1998) and Ontario (Pohl et al. 2018).
Frey & Boll (1876) described Lithocolletis affinis from “a Lonicera with red fruits” in Texas. Frey & Boll (1878) recorded Lonicera albida (= L. ×bella) and Symphoricarpos as hosts. Braun (1925b) recorded this species from Symphoricarpos in Utah; Maier & Davis (1989) from S. orbiculatus in Connecticut; Covell (1999) from Triosteum angustifolium in Kentucky; and Handfield (2002) from Lonicera sp. in Quebec.
Braun (1908) distinguished affinis and mariaeella on the basis of the forewing fasciae being “nearly straight” in the former and “distinctly bent outward near the middle” in the latter. The type material of mariaeella is lost, but at the CMCZ are three specimens matching Chambers’ description, collected by M.E. Murtfeldt at the type locality after the species was described. One is labeled “Symphoracarpus + 3/26 98” (Fig. 64); the other two are mounted together and labeled “On honeysuckle [6?]/29.99” (Figs. 65–66). One of the latter two is a male with its abdomen intact (Fig. 66); the others are missing their abdomens. T. Harrison (in litt.) has reared a series of specimens in Illinois from Lonicera maackii, L. prolifera [= reticulata], and Triosteum sp., with wing patterns showing a range of variation—some matching the Murtfeldt material and some matching the affinis type material in the BMNH (Fig. 67). Male and female genitalia are consistent among all of T. Harrison’s specimens (and with Figs. 57–61), and match the genitalia of a dissected male syntype of affinis. We therefore consider affinis a synonym of mariaeella. DRD has reared a large series of P. mariaeella from Lonicera tatarica at the Cornell University campus in Ithaca, New York, and D. Ferguson reared it from the same host in Halifax Co., Nova Scotia. CSE and T.S. Feldman have reared it from L. japonica and L. sempervirens in Durham and Scotland Cos., North Carolina (Figs. 56, 63).
Maier & Davis (1989) stated that Phyllonorycter mariaella [sic] is probably a junior synonym of the European P. emberizaepenella (Bouché). The latter species, however, differs in having a prominent white medial streak from the base of the forewing to the first fascia (absent in mariaeella), and in having a partially white head tuft (entirely reddish-brown in mariaeella). The two also differ markedly in the shape of the valvae and phallus, and in females of mariaeella the 7 th sternite possesses an ostial protrusion that is absent in emberizaepenella.
Comments. The larvae that gave rise to the type series of Phyllonorycter mariaeella were collected in Missouri on 25 October (Chambers 1875c). Frey & Boll (1878) reported two generations in Texas, with larvae occurring from June to July and again in November. Subsequent observations have essentially aligned with these dates: our North Carolina specimens were collected as larvae from 29 June to 10 July, with adults emerging from 13 July until sometime between 26 and 31 July; in Utah, Braun (1925b) collected a mine on 18 July and an adult emerged three days later; and in Connecticut, Maier & Davis (1989) reared adults from mines collected on 17 and 25 October.
description: Published as part of Eiseman, Charles S. & Davis, Donald R., 2020, Wrong side of the leaf: assigning some Lithocolletinae species (Lepidoptera: Gracillariidae) to their proper genera, pp. 201-237 in Zootaxa 4751 (2) on pages 224-229, DOI: 10.11646/zootaxa.4751.2.1, http://zenodo.org/record/3712951