Wingspan 10–11 mm.
The usual form has a brownish-grey ground color and four whitish-yellow spots, two on the costa and two on the dorsum. However, a unicolorous brownish-grey form without any pattern also occurs not very rarely.

The larva first lives in a small, hard to observe gallery at the underside of the leaf which is later enlarged into a small, transparant blotch mine.

At first in a small transparent blotch mine at the underside of the leaf in which the frass is concentrated at one side of the mine. The full-grown instar turns the tip of a leaf into a roll.
See also gracillariidae.net and bladmineerders.be.

A whitish silken cocoon.

At first a small gallery, then a whithish blotch and later on a leaf roll, made by cutting part of a leaf and rolling that part up and spinning it to the leaf.
Pupation takes place in the leaf roll where the larva first spins a whitish silken cocoon.
The species hibernates in the adult stage. The adults come to light.

The larvae feed on: Polygonum, Rumex or Lysimachia. Also other plants can be chosen but much less frequently.

The species prefers rather wet habitats where the foodplants grow, like meadows, river banks, etc.