The Lincolnshire Bird Club

Hi,

Significant numbers of the larvae of Horse Chestnut Leaf-miner moth Cameraria ohridella are present in the Horse Chestnut trees outside my house in Frampton village and I've seen adults coming to light. This species first colonised the UK in 2002, but according to the NBN Gateway there are no records yet in Lincolnshire. Does anyone know if this is still the case?

If you see what you think is a diseased Horse Chestnut with rusty, rather autumnal like leaves, hold a leaf up to the sun and see a very small caterpillar inside the leaf this is likely to be ohridella.

Cheers,

John

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Contact: recorder_south@lincsbirdclub.co.uk

We have noticed that Horse Chestnuts in Normanby Park in North Lincs have signs of leaf miner activity on the leaves which may be this species. Take a look at our blog at the following address to see photos. What do you think?

www.normanbynature.blogspot.com

Hi Wayne,

Looks good to me (or bad if you're a Horse Chestnut). On a bit of a tour of mid-Lincs around Horncastle today I noticed quite a few Horse Chestnust also apparantly affected. This must be one of very few micro-moths that you can identify while driving at 60mph! According to the interweb the moth doesn't have serious consequences for it's host. Perhaps blue/great tits might even welcome ohridella's arrival. Very few natural predators are known, but blue/great tits are responsible for 2-4% mortality among larvae.

In terms of my suggestion that the adults came to light, i'm not 100% yet whether they do. I saw an adult on my kitchen door window, which I assumed had been there since the following evening while retrieving various bottles of wine from the fridge, but then last night I caught none in my moth trap, despite a reasonable haul of other macro/micros.

Whether or not the species has been recorded in the county before it would seem that it's colonisation has been very rapid. I didn't mention before but I noticed the same problem with the Horse Chestnut outside my house last year (for the first time).

Cheers,

John

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Contact: recorder_south@lincsbirdclub.co.uk

It's 'rampant throughout the county' apparantly Poor horse chestnuts!

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Contact: recorder_south@lincsbirdclub.co.uk