Caloptilia magnifica is a moth

Moth

A moth is an insect closely related to the butterfly, both being of the order Lepidoptera. Moths form the majority of this order; there are thought to be 150,000 to 250,000 different species of moth , with thousands of species yet to be described...

 of the Gracillariidae

Gracillariidae

Gracillariidae is an important family of insects in the order Lepidoptera and the principal family of leaf miners that includes several economic, horticultural or recently invasive pest species such as the horse-chestnut leaf miner, Cameraria ohridella....

 family. It is known from the southern Alps

Alps

The Alps is one of the great mountain range systems of Europe, stretching from Austria and Slovenia in the east through Italy, Switzerland, Liechtenstein and Germany to France in the west....

 and former Yugoslavia

Yugoslavia

Yugoslavia refers to three political entities that existed successively on the western part of the Balkans during most of the 20th century....

.

The wingspan

Wingspan

The wingspan of an airplane or a bird, is the distance from one wingtip to the other wingtip. For example, the Boeing 777 has a wingspan of about ; and a Wandering Albatross caught in 1965 had a wingspan of , the official record for a living bird.The term wingspan, more technically extent, is...

 is 10.5-11 mm.

The larva

Larva

A larva is a distinct juvenile form many animals undergo before metamorphosis into adults. Animals with indirect development such as insects, amphibians, or cnidarians typically have a larval phase of their life cycle...

e of ssp. magnifica feed on Epimedium alpinum, while ssp. moriokensis feed on Epimedium grandiflorum var. thunbergianum

Epimedium grandiflorum

Epimedium grandiflorum is a species of flowering plant in the barberry family, Berberidaceae, that is native to China, Japan, and Korea. It may have aphrodisiac characteristics due to the presence of icariin and is believed to cause increased sexual activity in goats. It commonly is packed in a...

. They mine

Leaf miner

Leaf miner is a term used to describe the larvae of many different species of insect which live in and eat the leaf tissue of plants. The vast majority of leaf-mining insects are moths , sawflies and flies , though some beetles and wasps also exhibit this behavior.Like Woodboring beetles, leaf...

 the leaves of their host plant. The mine starts as a long, lower-surface, strongly branching, epidermal, corridor. Later, deeper layers of tissue are eaten and the mine develops into a tentiform mine with dispersed frass

Frass

Frass is the fine powdery material phytophagous insects pass as waste after digesting plant parts. It causes plants to excrete chitinase due to high chitin levels, it is a natural bloom stimulant, and has high nutrient levels. Frass is known to have abundant amoeba, beneficial bacteria, and fungi...

. Older larvae leave the mine and make a marginal roll on another leaf, almost always folded downwards. This leaf is eaten out from the inside. Pupation takes place in a yellowish white cocoon that is made at the margin usually of the same leaf.

Subspecies

• Caloptilia magnifica magnifica (Europe)
• Caloptilia magnifica moriokensis Kumata, 1982 (Japan (Honshū))