Cosmopterix pararufella

Cosmopterix pararufella is a butterfly (moth ) from the family of the splendor butterfly ( Cosmopterigidae ).

Features

The moths reach a wingspan of 11 mm. Cosmopterix pararufella similar Cosmopterix coryphaea very strong and is only slightly different: the white Dorsallinie starts at the wing base and the yellow band has a slightly larger extension towards the apex.

In the males the right brachium at the base is very narrow and about twice as long as the left. It expands into a forked and strongly sclerotized appendage. The Valven are rounded. The upper edge is concave, the lower is nearly straight, the Caudalrand is strongly convex. The Valvellae are short and square in the middle curved. They are parallel-walled, tapering apically to a blunt tip. The aedeagus is can -shaped. The rear portion extends distally light and has a ventral flange. Cosmopterix pararufella differs from Cosmopterix coryphaea by the fork- shaped extension of the right Brachiums, the rounded Valven and the slimmer Valvellae.

In females, the rear end of the 7th sternite arcuate. 8 the segment is slightly wider than long. The ostium is narrow and has wide semicircular Sklerotisierungen. The sterigma is wide and tapers slightly towards the ostium. The ductus bursae is slightly shorter than the corpus bursae and has a distal sclerotized ring. The corpus bursae is oval and has two round Signa, which are sclerotized crescent shaped.

Dissemination

Cosmopterix pararufella is in Spain ( Almería), Corsica, Greece, Crete, Cyprus and North Africa is home.

Biology

The caterpillars develop on sugarcane ( Saccharum officinarum ) and apparently also in some locally occurring grasses. The females lay eggs singly on the outside of the leaf midrib. The young caterpillars feed themselves with brown insect holes arise that are visible on the other side sheet as elongated spots in the leaf midrib. The herbivory causes the leaves snap off easily, turn yellow and dry up soon. The mine is at first the form of lines and then develops into a space mine. At the end of the mine, the caterpillars pupate in a chamber. Furthermore, there is a circular opening through which the moths emerge. In Egypt, the caterpillars nate from April to May and from September to October in sugarcane leaves and have become a pest in the cultivation of sugar cane. The infestation is located at the end of May from 12.3 to 15.8 percent, reaching a maximum of 28.5 percent in June. It makes two generations per year, the moths fly from May to June and in September.

Documents

• Splendor falter
• Cosmopterigidae