Leaf and stem mines of British flies and other insects

The larvae of many insects feed within the leaves and stems of plants. As they feed and grow, the larvae move through their host plant's tissues, often creating characteristic mines. A knowledge of a mining insect's host preferences coupled with the often diagnostic features of the mine and the lifestyle and form of the immature stages of the miner enable many species with known hosts to be identified, frequently more readily than the insect itself. Such is the state of our present knowledge, however, that adults should be reared whenever possible to be certain of their identity and to confirm the miner/host plant association.

Over 900 British insects are recorded mining leaves and stems. The majority of these are moths (Lepidoptera), the next largest group are flies (Diptera), the third largest group are beetles (Coleoptera) and smallest group are sawflies (Hymenoptera).
Scientific names of miners used follow 

Fauna Europaea

All British mining species are discussed, providing (where known) synonymy, descriptions of the mine, larva and pupa or puparium, host plant genera and species in Britain and Ireland, host plant genera and species elsewhere, time of year of mines, larvae, pupae and adults in Britain, distribution in Britain and Ireland and elsewhere and parasitoids. NBN Gateway distribution maps (where they exist) are also included.

All species pages include external links (where they exist) to relevant pages on other websites. The linked pages on the 

British leafminers and  Nederlandse bladmineerders websites usually include one or more images of a mine.The linked pages to Belgian Lepidoptera website often include images of mines. The libked pages on the UKMoths often include images of mines. The linked pages on the  Fauna Europaea website usually include taxonomic information and distribution by country in Europe. The linked pages on the National Biodiversity Network (NBN) website include taxonomic information and UK distribution maps. Search links using Google are included for all species.

A total of 786 host plant genera are discussed and the recorded miners occurring on 1,399 named species are listed. Many of the miner/host associations are based on host genera only. Scientific and common names of host plants follow the 

Botanical Society of the British Isles (BSBI) checklist.

Provisional keys are provided to dipterous mines recorded on 311 of these 783 host plant genera discussed here, although some of the records require confirmation. Access to the keys is provided by scientific and where possible by common name (N.B. only about 52% of the vascular plants recorded in Britain have common names). Images of the mines of 143 species are included.

More than 1200 references are included.