About Borkhausenia italica (Baldizzone, 1977)
Metalampra italica (originally published as Borkhausenia italica by Giorgio Baldizzone in 1977) is a moth species belonging to the family Oecophoridae. Until recently, this species was thought to be endemic to Italy. It is now confirmed to also occur in other European countries. As recently as 2013, Fauna Europaea only listed this species from Italy, but evidence shows it had already been present further north much earlier than this date. The species was first discovered in Devon, United Kingdom, in 2003. After this initial discovery, it has also been recorded in multiple other counties across southern England and Wales. It has also been recently recorded in Croatia, Germany, France, the Netherlands, Switzerland, and Belgium. In the Netherlands, the first known specimen was caught in 1985, but was misidentified as Metalampra cinnamomea. This species appears to be expanding its range. Specimens of M. italica are sometimes mislabelled as the more widespread Metalampra cinnamomea. M. italica can be distinguished from M. cinnamomea by the ground colour of its forewing. It remains unclear whether M. italica has only recently spread into Central Europe, or if its presence there simply went undetected until recently, at least partially due to misidentification of specimens as M. cinnamomea. Multiple confirmed cases of this misidentification have been found in existing collections. This species lives in forest environments, and prefers deciduous forests.
