Eupithecia pyreneata Mabille, 1871

Host plants:
The caterpillar feeds on yellow foxglove species (Digitalis lutea, Digitalis grandiflora).

Habitat:
Eupithecia pyreneata colonized open, rather dry and sunny deciduous forests. The larval habitats are mostly semi-shade.

Life cycle:
The moths fly in a single generation in June and July. The shoot tips of the larval host plant are heavily occupied with eggs at favourable places. The caterpillars live then from late June to August. Less commonly, it few moths of a partial second generation appear in August, especially in Southern Europe. The pupa overwinters.

Endangerment: endangered

Endangerment factors:
In Central Europe Eupithecia pyreneata is threatened by overgrowth of forests and afforestation of small open areas such as embankments. Eupithecia pyreneata can also be found in very small Digitalis stocks for a long time, but are just such occurrences quickly destroyed by random events such as tree-felling etc.

Remarks:
Eupithecia pyreneata is found in Southern and Central Europe. In Germany it occurs for example in the Jura Mountains, where I could watch them on the eastern Swabian Alb in an open beech forest whith adjacent steppe-like grasslands with Eupithecia extraversaria. In Greece, I met larvae at Mount Olympus in partially shaded pine/beech forests in some 1000m above sea level.