Galls are in the form of distinct swellings on leaf petioles, midribs and stems on new foliage of both young growth and mature trees. Mean length of a gall containing a single wasp is 2.1 mm, and leaves of rapidly growing trees may contain greater than 50 galls per leaf (Mendel et al. 2004). The female wasps insert eggs into the upper side of the leaves and stems. As larvae develop, galls begin to form and the green color of the leaves containing the galls turns glossy pink. Subsequently, the leaf glossiness then diminishes and the galls turn from pink to red. Upon emergence of the wasps, the galls on the leaves turn light brown and the galls on the stems turn reddish-brown. The adults leave round exit holes after emergence

The majority of Eucalyptus species have been confirmed to be susceptible to L. invasa (Jorge et al., 2016). Among these, E. camaldulensis (var. camaldulensis and obtusa), E. grandis, E. robusta and E. tereticornis showed remarkably high susceptibility ... To date, the only susceptible species not belonging to the Eucalyptus genus is Corymbia polycarpa ...

[F]emales usually prefer newly developed leaves, where they lay their eggs in the midribs, petioles and parenchyma tissue of twigs. Usually eggs are laid in a lined group at a distance of 0.3-0.5 mm of each other ... Gall development consists of five stages, described in Mendel et al. (2004):

• First stage: ... a little spot of dead cells ... similar to a cork tissue .,.. A change in colour from green to pink or reddish usually occurs to the cells of midribs ... and the spherical shape of the gall starts to be visible ... usually 1-2 weeks after deposition ...
• Second [to fourth] stage[s]: ... galls ... attain the typical green bump-shape ... [then] lose their green colour, turning into a glossy reddish colour. [After this] galls lose their glossiness, turning into dull pink/dark red.
• Fifth stage: [adults emerge and g]all colours turn to light brown on the leaf or red-brown on the stems ...

First and second stages of L. invasa galls could be confused with early stages of Ophelimus maskelli galls, but while L. invasa makes bump-shaped galls on petioles, leaf midribs and young branches, O. maskelli induces blister-like galls on the leaf’s surface ...