A worldwide community photographing and learning about wildlife
Project Noah Nature School
Caloptilia bimaculatella
This tiny moth is only 4 mm long. I thought it was a leaf hopper at first. The antennae are as long as the body and held flat against the back of the wings. It is dark brown with white spots, a white face and brown and white legs. Family Gracillariidae, Micro-Lepidoptera.
Came to an ultraviolet light in the garden, San Cristobal de Las Casas, 2,200 meters.
There are 326 species listed for this genus of tiny leaf miner moths! (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caloptilia). The Red Maple is one of the main host plant trees for C. bimaculatella (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acer_rubrum...).
Thanks dotun. You're so right! I had to shoot about 40 pictures to get a couple of OK ones. :)
Impressive! Tiny moths like this with the Plume moths are often tough to get on (my) camera.
Thank you stho002. It certainly seems really like this one. The wing spots are not exact, but could be variation only. I was seeing that it feeds on Maple leaves and we do have some ornamental maples in gardens here.
Thank you Rob. Thank you Shekainah, it really is similar to the Euclasta species, which seem to be Southeast Asia, Indo-Pacific and Australia. I saw your spotting (https://www.projectnoah.org/spottings/12...), which is very nice! These guys are so tiny. Also the Euclasta spotting of Annvan is very nice (https://www.projectnoah.org/spottings/37...).
Spotted on Apr 18, 2014
Submitted on Apr 20, 2014
