Oecophoridae

28.027 Gold-flecked Hopper Aplota palpellus (Haworth, 1828)

pRDB2

Similar species:

Forewing: 5.5 to 7mm

Habitats: Deciduous woodland.

Habits: The moth rests on moss during the day and occasionally comes to light.

Foodplant: The larva feeds from a yellowish frass peppered and branching silk gallery amongst exposed mosses a few metres above the ground growing on rocks, walls and the trunks of elm, oak and Beech. The mosses include Silky Wall Feather-moss Homalothecium sericeum, Cypress-leaved Plait-moss Hypnum cupressiforme, bristle mosses Ondotrichum spp. and other mosses. Pupation takes place in a flimsy white silk cocoon at the end of a gallery, in a bark crevice or a crevice in a wall.