Start of the Aestevating aphids Periphyllus aceris story

[Lord V]

Last year I photographed a bunch of odd looking bugs that eventually turned out to be Aestevating aphids -Periphyllus aceris. The aphids were in small patches on the underside of bonsai acer leaves.
These shots show an adult that was egg laying yesterday until I disturbed it and a patch of eggs. Not sure if the patch is the work of several aphids or just one but seems rather a lot for one aphid - there were about 5 adults on the leaf and only two egg patches

[Gerel]

Hi Brian,

your second shot looks like something I get a lot of on sycamore leaves



which, when I posted about it last year, was identified by Chris Yeates as "an 'erineum' caused by an eriophyid mite - Aceria pseudoplatani". Not connected to the aphids.

I also saw this aphid on sycamore recently, looks similar to yours.



regards

Steve

[jaguarondi]

The aphid looks neither like a Periphyllus (cornicles too long, body not hairy enough) nor an adult (it's obviously going to be winged but the wings aren't fully developed). I don't know what's going on - maybe the aphid is a sub-adult sycamore aphid (Drepanosiphum) but hard to say until it becomes adult.

[Lord V]

Well I might be interpolating too much, The patches looked very similar to the patches of aestevating aphid I had on the same leaves last year. One of the aphids had it's bum stuck into the edge of the patch when I first turned the leaf over. Must admit i was suprised at the irregular sizes of what I thought was the egg mass under higher magnification.

Brian v.

[Gerel]

I didn't mean that comment to sound definative, I merely thought that it could be a possibilty.

Steve

[Lord V]

Think I'll just have to see what the white masses turns into. Agree the adult aphid does not look anything like the very hairy jouveniles I photographed last year. Could well be a case of seeing what I wanted to see
Brian v.