Coleophora alnifoliae
Encyclopedia
Coleophora alnifoliae is a moth
of the Coleophoridae
family. It is found in Europe
, from Fennoscandia
to the Pyrenees
, Sardinia
, Italy
and Romania
and from Great Britain
to the Baltic States
and Poland
. It is also known from North America
.
The wingspan
is 12–13 mm. The moth flies from July to August depending on the location.
The larvae feed on Alder
. They create a slender, brown spathulate leaf case, in the end about 13 mm long. The mouth angle is about 15°. Larvae appear in September and feed to the end of October, making two youth cases in this period, then go into hibernation. They resume feeding in May and make their final case, in which they pupate around June. In Britain, the larvae often hibernate a second time.
Moth
A moth is an insect closely related to the butterfly, both being of the order Lepidoptera. Moths form the majority of this order; there are thought to be 150,000 to 250,000 different species of moth , with thousands of species yet to be described...
of the Coleophoridae
Coleophoridae
| name = Case-bearers| image = Coleophoridae-01 .jpg| image_width = 240px| image_caption = Adult of an unidentified case-bearer species| regnum = Animalia| phylum = Arthropoda| classis = Insecta| ordo = Lepidoptera| superfamilia = Gelechioidea...
family. It is found in Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
, from Fennoscandia
Fennoscandia
Fennoscandia and Fenno-Scandinavia are geographic and geological terms used to describe the Scandinavian Peninsula, the Kola Peninsula, Karelia and Finland...
to the Pyrenees
Pyrenees
The Pyrenees is a range of mountains in southwest Europe that forms a natural border between France and Spain...
, Sardinia
Sardinia
Sardinia is the second-largest island in the Mediterranean Sea . It is an autonomous region of Italy, and the nearest land masses are the French island of Corsica, the Italian Peninsula, Sicily, Tunisia and the Spanish Balearic Islands.The name Sardinia is from the pre-Roman noun *sard[],...
, Italy
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...
and Romania
Romania
Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central and Southeastern Europe, on the Lower Danube, within and outside the Carpathian arch, bordering on the Black Sea...
and from Great Britain
Great Britain
Great Britain or Britain is an island situated to the northwest of Continental Europe. It is the ninth largest island in the world, and the largest European island, as well as the largest of the British Isles...
to the Baltic States
Baltic states
The term Baltic states refers to the Baltic territories which gained independence from the Russian Empire in the wake of World War I: primarily the contiguous trio of Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania ; Finland also fell within the scope of the term after initially gaining independence in the 1920s.The...
and Poland
Poland
Poland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...
. It is also known from North America
North America
North America is a continent wholly within the Northern Hemisphere and almost wholly within the Western Hemisphere. It is also considered a northern subcontinent of the Americas...
.
The wingspan
Wingspan
The wingspan of an airplane or a bird, is the distance from one wingtip to the other wingtip. For example, the Boeing 777 has a wingspan of about ; and a Wandering Albatross caught in 1965 had a wingspan of , the official record for a living bird.The term wingspan, more technically extent, is...
is 12–13 mm. The moth flies from July to August depending on the location.
The larvae feed on Alder
Alder
Alder is the common name of a genus of flowering plants belonging to the birch family . The genus comprises about 30 species of monoecious trees and shrubs, few reaching large size, distributed throughout the North Temperate Zone and in the Americas along the Andes southwards to...
. They create a slender, brown spathulate leaf case, in the end about 13 mm long. The mouth angle is about 15°. Larvae appear in September and feed to the end of October, making two youth cases in this period, then go into hibernation. They resume feeding in May and make their final case, in which they pupate around June. In Britain, the larvae often hibernate a second time.