Charley Eiseman
@ceiseman.bsky.social
Freelance naturalist, especially into leafminers, sawfly larvae, and other underappreciated herbivorous insects | http://bugtracks.wordpress.com
Stop everything! Ray Gagne has just finished the second edition of "The Plant-Feeding Gall Midges of North America" and it's freely available here: zenodo.org/records/2137...
The Plant-Feeding Gall Midges of North America
This revision of The Plant-Feeding Gall Midges of North America, originally published in 1989, began as soon as the earlier book was in press. Since then, more than half again as many records of plant...
zenodo.org
@scottpegan.bsky.social Weird thing on a Q. virginiana branch for your consideration: www.inaturalist.org/observations...
Insects (Class Insecta)
Insects from Riverview, FL, USA on June 21, 2026 at 06:42 AM by Ryan Callahan
inaturalist.org
These purplish midribs of smooth aster (Symphyotrichum laeve) leaves are caused by mining of Ophiomyia astericosta (Agromyzidae), a species I named with Owen Lonsdale earlier this year. Never noticed them in my yard until just now!
Warblers feasting on leaf-mining sawfly larvae: www.inaturalist.org/observations...
Northern Parula (Setophaga americana)
Northern Parula from Manhattan, New York, NY, USA on May 11, 2026 at 05:30 PM by David Jeffrey Ringer. raiding leafmines of Profenusa canadensis on hawthorn (images in reverse chronological order)
inaturalist.org
I just put together a wish list of North American Phyllocnistis leaf mines. I'm hoping for larvae from each of them for DNA barcoding, and eventually I'll need reared adult specimens to describe the ones that are new species (which is probably most of them): www.inaturalist.org/projects/lea...
I think this is the first time I've seen a species I named turn up on a federally Threatened plant: www.inaturalist.org/observations...
Phytomyza verbenae
Phytomyza verbenae in May 2026 by Ryan Donnelly. Host Verbena californica (CRPR 1B.1, Federally Threatened, State Threatened)
inaturalist.org
Can anyone tell me what is the surname in the Indonesian name "Tjoa Tjien Mo"? I've found examples of all three being interpreted as the surname.
Always fun to see species I named turn up on @inaturalist.bsky.social, and even more so when people ID them without my help! Phytomyza nemophilae was originally described from specimens @cosmopterix.bsky.social reared from Nemophila, and has since been reared... www.inaturalist.org/observations...
Phytomyza nemophilae
Phytomyza nemophilae from Building 3, Portland, OR 97229, USA on May 4, 2026 at 02:00 PM by Tser
inaturalist.org
First leafminer I've seen this year! This is a larva of Aulagromyza cornigera (Agromyzidae) almost done mining a leaf of honeyberry (Lonicera caerulea) in Massachusetts. Probably tomorrow it will drop to the ground and pupate, emerging as an adult next April. #FlyWeek
Happy #FlyWeek! If you're in northeastern North America, please keep an eye out for this mystery leafminer on hackberry--an Agromyza species that has never been reared. Larvae are present only in spring, and rearing adults will require keeping puparia happy until next spring.
Profile of @ceiseman.bsky.social's leafminer work. #inaturalist #leafminers #insects #moths #flies #sawflies #beetles #entomology www.inaturalist.org/blog/124811
Identifier Profile: @ceiseman
This is the twenty-ninth entry in an ongoing series profiling the amazing identifiers of iNaturalist. An iNaturalist observation records an encounter between an observer and an organism or recent evid...
inaturalist.org
In case anyone's keeping track (I had lost track until just now), I've now helped name 115 new insect species, 95 of them being agromyzid flies described with Owen Lonsdale. You can find them all here: bugtracks.wordpress.com/taxonomy/
Taxonomy
Although I have essentially no formal entomological training, I have been involved in the describing and naming of many new insect species with various taxonomist collaborators, and I have recently…
bugtracks.wordpress.com
This greenbriar leafminer, Marmara smilacisella, adorned its cocoon with clusters of pearlescent bubbles. I wish my holiday decorations were so neat!
I learned this on the podcast Criminal: there was a court case about moon rock theft called “United States vs. One Lucite Ball Containing Lunar Material (One Moon Rock) and One Ten Inch By Fourteen Inch Wooden Plaque”. The lucite ball, truly the US' most fearsome enemy www.forbes.com/2010/07/08/l...
United States Vs. One Moon Rock
Having a moon rock may not be illegal, but getting one almost certainly is.
forbes.com
The "October 2025" journal issue just showed up in my mailbox, so I guess my new species name is validly published at this point, even though @bioone.bsky.social still hasn't gotten its act together: www.inaturalist.org/observations...
Telamoptilia malvavisci
Telamoptilia malvavisci from 1246 Lakeside Blvd, Brownsville, TX 78520, USA on February 22, 2021 at 06:47 PM by David Jeffrey Ringer. Telamoptilia cf. hibiscivora per Charley Eiseman. Reared from a m...
inaturalist.org
Finally published! "Thirty-three new species of Agromyzidae (Diptera) from the United States and Canada, with new host and distribution records for 154 additional species." Now I've got some updating to do on BugGuide and iNaturalist...
Thirty-three new species of Agromyzidae (Diptera) from the United States and Canada, with new host and distribution records for 154 additional species | Zootaxa
mapress.com
Here's a tiny trichogrammatid wasp stuck to a gall midge larva, which is pretty tiny itself... Check out my blog post for more about this midge species (I'm afraid I don't have much to say about how the wasp came to be stuck to it).
Sticktoitiveness
Thanks to the fact that I have a searchable email account, and never delete any emails, I was able to quickly reconstruct this timeline just now: On August 1, 2007, I got a reply from Mark Allison,…
bugtracks.wordpress.com
New study: backyard mosquito sprays lead to insecticide levels high enough to kill pollinators, and sprays travel easily into neighboring yards. stacksjournal.org/article/ande...
An initial assessment of risk to pollinators from mosquito control in residential settings - Stacks Journal
Peer-reviewed research - An initial assessment of risk to pollinators from mosquito control in residential settings
stacksjournal.org
What do we think, does that say "N.J." at the top? No other labels on this moth specimen. Mary Murtfeldt was born in NYC but every publication of hers I've seen involves observations from Missouri, which is definitely where she was based in 1891.
See the influential paper and @undark.org commentary on Monsanto's ghostwriting by Alexander Kaurov & @naomioreskes.bsky.social: undark.org/2025/08/15/o... #pesticides #agtwitter
169 for me (out of 7351). Surprisingly these only include seven of the species I've named. I guess many of the others are only on BugGuide.
Colin Purrington@colinpurrington.bsky.social · 8mo agoIf you're bored and use iNaturalist, here's a link to a tool that displays which of your observations were the first recorded for a taxon. I apparently have 16 (out of 3,395). I need to get out more. 🌿 #inaturalist #nature #insects #spiders glauberramos.github.io/inat/first-o...
Wondering who would cut 30 semicircular slits into the upper epidermis of a Cameraria leaf mine, and why... www.inaturalist.org/observations...
Genus Cameraria
Cameraria from Greenville County, SC, USA on June 20, 2025 at 03:36 PM by Grace Merkert
inaturalist.org
I've got your 2026 Leafminers of North America wall calendars right here!
That time of year again!
I’ve just finished putting together the wall calendar that my most generous patrons receive as a thank-you gift each year. As usual, I will also send a copy to anyone who makes a donation of at lea…
bugtracks.wordpress.com
A well-loved bunchberry plant (Cornus canadensis) with leaf mines of Phytomyza agromyzina (lower left), Antispila cornifoliella (other linear mines), Antispila freemani (big blotches), and a Caloptilia sp. (narrow blotch and leaf roll at right), as well as stippling from leafhopper feeding.
Ah yes, "gall nuts," the common name universally used for the genus Quercus...
