Coleophoridae

37.061 Downland Case-bearer Coleophora lixella Zeller, 1849

Notable B

Similar species:

Forewing: 7.5 to 10mm

Habitats: Downland and dry rocky grassland slopes.

Habits: The moth flies in sunshine and later comes to light.

Foodplant: The larva initially feeds on the developing seeds in a floret of thyme. When the floret is empty it is cut off and used as a case. It then either feeds on other floret or mines a leaf from the tip of the underside, before overwintering probably attached to a stem. When it starts feeding again in March, it becomes polyphagous on grasses such as Yorkshire-fog, Cock's-foot, Quaking-grass, Sweet Vernal-grass and Annual Meadow-grass. In April it makes a new case from a mined blade of grass, sometimes abandoning the original case and other times incorporating it. The case is expanded by fixing the case on a grass margin, sealing the cases mouth, slitting it ventrally, mining to length the grass margin, attaching the case and cutting away the leaf margin. It pupates in late May, attached low in the vegetation. This final bivalved, straw coloured case is 11mm long, m.o. at a 25° angle.