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Field Guide Descriptions: Covell (1984); Beadle and Leckie (2012) | Online Photographs: MPG, BugGuide, iNaturalist, Google, BAMONA, GBIF, BOLD | Technical Description, Adults: Soloman (1995) | Technical Description, Immature Stages: MacKay (1959); Soloman (1995) | |
| Adult Markings: In this species the palps and antennae are brown and the head tuft brownish black. The thorax is mottled with brown and black and has a blackish scale tuft on the posterior half. The basal half of the forewing is dark brown to grayish brown with fine blackish mottling. The dark coloration extends from the base to about mid-way on the inner margin, then slants posteriorly towards the costal margin and adjoins a pronounced pale dirty white to pinkish white region that covers much of the remainder of the forewing. The whitish region has a small irregular black patch on the inner margin in the subtornal region. Smaller fine black specks and spots may extend from the black patch towards the costa. Just beyond four-fifths, a rather faint and slightly curved dark brown to blackish streak extends from above the costal margin to near the mid-point of the termen. The hindwings are uniformly gray. The adults can be easily identified by the rather distinctive patterning on the forewing. Ecdytolopha mana is similar, but lacks the black patch in the subtornal region and specializes on hackberries (Celtis). |
| Wingspan: 17-26 mm (Soloman, 1995). |
| Forewing Length: 9-13.5 mm (Gilligan et al., 2008). |
| Adult Structural Features: Gilligan et al., 2008 and Gilligan and Epstein (TortAI) provide descriptions and illustrations of the male and female genitalia. The male genitalia are characterized by a rounded tegumen, long valvae, and deciduous cornuti in the vesica. The female genitalia have a deep invagination of sternum VII where the ostium is located, two signa in the corpus bursae, and a sclerotized patch near the junction of the corpus bursae and ductus bursae. Males can be separated from other Ecdytolopha species by a hair pencil in a narrow concavity on the anal margin of the hindwing. Females can be separated by genitalic characters. |
| Structural photos |
Male genitalia from a specimen collected from Ashe Co. (J.B. Sullivan) |
Female genitalia from a specimen from Ashe Co. (J.B. Sullivan) |
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| Adult ID Requirements: Identifiable from good quality photos of unworn specimens. |
Immatures and Development: The following is based on Soloman's (1995) detailed description of the life history when feeding on Black Locust, which is the primary host. Harman and Berisford (1979) also have a detailed account of the larval life history. Females lay their eggs on bark and each hatchling bores a hole into a current-year stem with succulent growth. It then feeds on the stem pith and internal tissues to create an elongated gallery. The gallery is often > 10 cm in length, and most larvae bore towards the shoot tip. Boring typically triggers the plants to produce elongated, gall-like swellings that are readily evident during the winter months. The entrance hole almost always begins at a thorn base where the petiole attaches, and the larva periodically ejects frass from the hole. Each gallery usually contains only one larva, but in rare instances a gallery can contain up to 3-5 larvae. There are seven instars that vary from dull yellow in the early stages to bright crimson in the final instars. The mature larvae are 18-20 mm in length, with a yellowish-brown to brownish-black head and a yellowish-brown thoracic shield and anal plate (MacKay, 1959). Development for the first seasonal brood takes around 20 days, and the mature larvae leave the shoots and pupate under leaf litter. Populations in the southern portion of the range typically have a second generation. The larvae in the second generation overwinter in the galleries, and the adults emerged during the spring warm-up.
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| Larvae ID Requirements: Identifiable from good quality photos, especially where associated with known host plants. |