#34 Napomyza crepidicaulis by Barry Warrington
Meet Barry Warrington, organiser of the National Agromyzidae Recording Scheme!
Barry is the organiser of the National Agromyzidae Recording Scheme. As a scheme organiser, he collates and verify hundreds of records each month and answers the many queries he receives on a daily basis. Before he launched the recording scheme, Agromyzidae (leaf mining flies) was a rather niche family, but thanks to his passion and promotion of the family, along with always being happy to help others with ID queries and the like, interest has grown massively. There are now over 200 individuals submitting records each year. You can follow the recording scheme on Twitter at @AgromyzidaeRS.
Napomyza crepidicaulis, male.
Barry’s chosen species is Napomyza crepidicaulis Warrington, 2021, a species he discovered as new to science in 2020 on a newly created flood alleviation site in Anlaby, East Yorkshire. The Agromyzidae are a family of leaf-miner flies, so called because of the feeding habits of their larvae, which ‘mine’ the tissue of host plants to eat. Though leaf is in the name, they also utilise other parts of the host plant, such as the stem, seeds, roots, or trunks and twigs. Most species only feed on one host plant (monophagous), but some feed on multiple genera within a single family or several related families (oligophagous) of plant. Barry found puparia of this species inside the stems of Crepis capillaris (smooth hawksbeard) which were then reared to adulthood. Examining the resulting adult flies in great detail (chiefly the genitalia) confirmed they were an undescribed species.
The discovery of any species new to science is always exciting, so to have one in Yorkshire just highlights how much there is still to discover. As most Napomyza sp are difficult to determine on external (and sometimes internal) features, rearing collected puparia is essential in understanding the species involved with relevant host plants. Up until Zlobin (1994) discovered that there are several species within the lateralis-group, it was believed that another species, Napomyza lateralis, utilised a wide range of plants as a host and was variable in its appearance and genitalia. Since the turn of the millennium, there have been only three other new Napomyza species described worldwide – making this discovery all the more impressive. As this species was only discovered recently, it is not possible to ascertain its status in the UK or further afield and due to the difficulty in finding and rearing the puparia and determining adult specimens. These tiny specimens (usually only a few mm in size) require complicated, delicate dissection of the male and female genitalia to be identified, so it is likely that only experts in Agromyzidae will be able to improve our understanding of this species in terms of distribution and phenology. Who knows what else we might have in Yorkshire? The National Agromyzidae Recording Scheme website is an impressive resource full of information regarding UK species and their identification, including keys, a glossary, and host plant A-Z.
Larvae inside the host plant.
This species also helped kick-started a change in environmental management in the local area. The site where N. crepidicaulis was found was private, so Barry approached the land owners and manager to see if he could be granted permission to formally study the Agromyzidae species present on site (thankfully, he was granted permission!). During the first few months of monitoring the site, he discovered another species of Agromyzidae, Cerodontha (Xenophytomyza) vinokurovi, to be present which was previously only known from the female holotype collected in eastern Siberia! It soon became apparent that the site was extremely biologically important, locally, regionally and nationally. After many emails and correspondence trying to persuade the land owners to change their management regime for the site, they kindly agreed to manage the site as a biodiversity site, based on Barry’s proposals. This included changing the cutting regime of vegetation on site, allowing plants, and subsequently the insects that rely on their full life cycle, to flourish. More details of this can be found here. In light of the ongoing declines of insects, this serves as a fantastic example of just how much one dedicated person can achieve.
Recording & monitoring
The site where N. crepidicaulis was first discovered.
The National Agromyzidae Recording Scheme welcomes photographic records of adult and larval material, which it encourages through iRecord or through email to agromyzidaers@gmail.com (in excel spreadsheet format with all the usual recording information – a template can be found on the website). Records will then be verified by Barry.
Having found a new species to science right on his doorstep, Barry would encourage anyone to ‘get out there, be inquisitive’, and you’ll be amazed at what you can find! He stresses the vital importance of submitting any records you make to the relevant recording scheme and your LERC as without records, species and their habitats can't be given the best possible chance of protection – without records, we simply don't know what's out there.
Further information and acknowledgements
NEYEDC would like to thank Barry for his time and expertise in helping to create this blog.
Zlobin, V. V. 1994. Review of mining flies of the genus Napomyza Westwood (Diptera: Agromyzidae). IV. Palaearctic species of lateralis-group. – Dipterological Research 5 (1): 39-78.