rearing leafminers

[Nick Greatorex-Davies]

David Smith wrote:

>>> "David Smith" <idleweed at tusco.net> 22/02/99 15:20:04 >>>
This summer and fall I plan to try to raise lepidopterous leafminers. I have
raised some with little success and I would appreciate any hints or help
from anyone experienced at this. My main problem is the leaves getting
moldy.
                      Thanks


Many years ago I raised quite large numbers of tree feeding lepidopterous leaf-miners (mostly from fagaceae - Oak, Beech, Sweet Chestnut) by simply cutting away the leaf from around the mine and placing the bits of leaf with the mines in small corked glass tubes (1 or 1.5 cms x 5cms). As I recall they could also be overwintered this way by occasionlly pipetting a drop of water on a piece of crumpled tissue at the bottom of the tube. I also used small plastic boxes for summer broods - or even just "mini-grip" polythene bags.

They can also be successfully overwintered by placing the entire leaves in clay plant pots half-filled with soil / sand and covered with some fine muslin netting tied over the pot and kept outside and exposed to the elements but not allowed to get too wet. Pots should not be kept in full sun, but a little sun should do them no harm during the winter months and even a little dappled sun in the Spring. Pots can be brought indoors a little while before they are expected to emerge.  However, in my experience, things shut up in pots like this do tend to be in advance of their free brethren, so don't be caught out by early emergences.

I have not tried it, but I would think that leaves with mines placed in tied up strong fine muslin bags and fixed near ground level would also overwinter the mines successfully.

You will get lots of tiny parasitic wasps emerge as well of course.

Hope this helps. I will be interested in any ideas other people might come up with.

Kind regards

Nick Greatorex-Davies



Mr J Nick Greatorex-Davies
(UK Butterfly Monitoring Scheme co-ordinator)
Institute of Terrestrial Ecology
Monks Wood
Abbots Ripton
Huntingdon
Cambridgeshire PE17 2LS  UK

Tel: (+44) (0) 1487 773 381
Fax: (+44) (0) 1487 773 467
E-mail: n.greatorex-davies at ite.ac.uk