Status and Distribution
Scarce.
Only previously known as a very local species in Monmouthshire, West Gloucestershire and Worcestershire, where it still occurs. In June 2020 four imagines were found over a period of a week (K & S Hand, and M. Gray pers. comm.) at a large woodland complex with considerable Tilia cordata (small-leaved lime), in Lincolnshire. Later, tenanted folds were found and larvae photographed. A further imago was seen here in 2025.
Following the Lincolnshire discovery, it's status in Northern Europe was checked with Keld Gregersen who advised 'the species is very rare over most of NW Europe. However, it appears to be a little more common in eastern Germany and Poland, but still occurs local and singly. In Denmark, it is taken in a few places in the southernmost part of the country (but recently, only at one site). In the Netherlands, it was gone for many years but was recaptured in 2011 and 2013 in the southern part of the country. All over Northern Europe, it seems to breed only on Tilia., .....further south it is more common, and here it lives on many different deciduous trees. D. ustalella is not known to be migratory.'
