Proteoteras aesculana

Hosts: Maple, boxelder. Silver maple, boxelder, sugar maple, and bigleaf maple have been listed specifically. Other maple species are probably hosts (Craighead 1950, Powell 1962).

Larvae hollow out dormant buds and seeds in fall and continue to feed on dormant buds in spring (MacAloney and Ewan 1964). During the growing season, larvae bore in the current year's shoots, often killing them and preventing terminal growth. Frass, which is ejected from the galleries, is mixed with webbing to form shelters around the entrances. When terminals are killed, opposite lateral shoots begin elongating and often produce forks or other deformities. Larval entrance holes are typically present near the base of current season's growth. When an infesation is sufficiently severe, trees become bushy and disfigured (MacAloney and Ewan 1964). Large trees have been so heavily injured in early summer in West Virginia that they appeared to have been damaged by heavy frost. In the Pacific Northwest, 7 to 50% of bigleaf maple seeds have been destroyed by this borer. Boxelders planted in nurseries and shelterbelts and as ornamentals are often heavily infested in the northern Great Plains, as is sugar maple in the northern Great Lakes area (MacAloney and Ewan 1964).

Range: Transcontinental in distribution across the northern United States and south to Mississippi (Furniss and Carolin 1977, Powell 1962). Discontinuously distributed across Canada, from Nova Scotia to southern Alberta (Prentice 1965).

Proteoteras aesculana n. sp.

Described from eight specimens bred from larvae boring the tender twigs of Buckeye and of Maple in Missouri.

Proteoteras aesculana

Hosts: Maple, boxelder. Silver maple, boxelder, sugar maple, and bigleaf maple have been listed specifically. Other maple species are probably hosts (Craighead 1950, Powell 1962).

Larvae hollow out dormant buds and seeds in fall and continue to feed on dormant buds in spring (MacAloney and Ewan 1964). During the growing season, larvae bore in the current year's shoots, often killing them and preventing terminal growth. Frass, which is ejected from the galleries, is mixed with webbing to form shelters around the entrances. When terminals are killed, opposite lateral shoots begin elongating and often produce forks or other deformities. Larval entrance holes are typically present near the base of current season's growth. When an infesation is sufficiently severe, trees become bushy and disfigured (MacAloney and Ewan 1964). Large trees have been so heavily injured in early summer in West Virginia that they appeared to have been damaged by heavy frost. In the Pacific Northwest, 7 to 50% of bigleaf maple seeds have been destroyed by this borer. Boxelders planted in nurseries and shelterbelts and as ornamentals are often heavily infested in the northern Great Plains, as is sugar maple in the northern Great Lakes area (MacAloney and Ewan 1964).

Range: Transcontinental in distribution across the northern United States and south to Mississippi (Furniss and Carolin 1977, Powell 1962). Discontinuously distributed across Canada, from Nova Scotia to southern Alberta (Prentice 1965).

Proteoteras aesculana

The larva of another moth, Proteoteras aesculana Riley, also works in the leaf stalks of both buckeye and maple and extends its tunnels for a distance of about 0.5 inch to 2 inches into the slender terminal twigs of both these trees, often causing a pseudogall.

Proteoteras aesculana Riley.

This species, which commonly feeds on the Buckeye, has been sent to me by Mr. L. Bruner from West Point, Nebr., on the short twigs of Celtis occidentalis. What is, without much doubt, the same species, has also been found upon the young shoots of Maple (Acer dasycarpum [saccharinum]) as also of Box Elder (Negundo aceroides).

Proteoteras aesculana

1. The larva here described [Sericoris instrutana, now Celypha cespitana] bores the leaf-stalk of the buckeye and only once have I found a specimen in the terminal twigs. P aesculanum bores the terminal twig as well as the leaf-stalk.

2. P. aesculanum bores the terminal twigs of maple (Acer dasycarpum [saccharinum]) . I have never seen a specimen of the insect here described on a maple nor have I seen a maple twig or leaf showing indications of its presence.

3. P. aesculanum often forms a swelling or pseudogall on the stem. The species here alluded to never forms a gall.

4. P. aesculanum lives in the gall apparently through almost its whole larval stage. The insect here described, however, quits the leaf-stalk at the end of two or three days and lives in a rolled-up leaf.

5. P. aesculanum bores the stem to a depth of from 13 to 50 mm. The insect here alluded to seldom or never exceeds 13 mm. in its boring.

Proteoteras aesculana Riley

Food plants: Acer, Aesculus

Range: KS, MO, IO, IL, OH, PA, NJ, DC, MD, WV, OR, CA, Ontario, Vancouver, Manitoba

Lepidopteron (species undetermined) [this entry is included on the basis of the similarity of the gall; no formal assertion that this is the same species is known]

This gall, (PI. XIX, Fig. 2) is an aborted shoot from a lateral bud, developing very rapidly in the early spring, reaching its full size (in Kansas) toward the end of April. 1.5 ~ 3 cm. long, 4-6 mm. wide. The nodes near the end of the gall bear small leaves which die early. Affected stems either smooth or pubescent. The larva finishes feeding on the central part of the galled twig and leaves the structure during the early part of May. It always eats out a circular hole near the base to make its exit. (PI. XIII, Fig. 2 a). The gall soon after turns brown and drops from the parent branch.

Patton (26) has described a "hollow, elongate, twig swelling" from which he states cecidomyidous flies emerged "about the middle of June." From his brief description it is impossible to state whether his gall is the same as the one here described. The flies noted might have been parasitic on the lepidopteron.

Riley reports a tortricid, Proteoteras aesculana Riley, occurring on the hackberry. No mention of any gall is made, however, in connection with this tree, other than that the larvae were found "on short twigs." On the buckeye and maple it "bores in the terminal green twigs, producing a swelling or pseudo-gall." (See Am. Nat. cit. below). This may be the insect concerned in the production of the lepidopterous gall herewith described, but from this mere suggestion of its gall forming habit, it is impossible to be certain.