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| Insects of Britain and Ireland: the families of Diptera |
Formerly referred to Clusiidae
Adult insects. Very small (about 2 mm long); winged. Antennae 3 segmented; ‘modified’; aristate; the arista dorsal (dorsal, or at least sub-apical, and very short). The second antennal segment not grooved. Ptilinal suture clearly defined. Post-vertical orbital bristles present; strong and divergent. Mouthparts functional. The maxillary palps 1 segmented; porrect. Vibrissae absent. Thorax without a continuous dorsal suture; without well defined posterior calli. Wing venation complete, in the sense of exhibiting 1st and 2nd basal, anal and discal cells. Wings with a discal cell (large); without a sub-apical cell; with a closed anal cell. The anal cell short (distally convex). The costa with one break (near the humeral cross vein). Sub-costa apparent; reaching the costa independently of vein 1. Wing vein 4 extending far beyond the end of the first basal cell. Wing vein 6 present; falling short of the wing margin. Wings with the lower calypter much reduced or absent. Hind tibiae without strong bristles in the basal 4/5.
Larvae and pupae. The larvae acephalic. The pupae enclosed within a puparium.
Comments. Blackish flies.
Classification. Suborder Brachycera; Division Muscomorpha Schizophora Acalyptratae; Superfamily Opomyzoidea.
British representation. 2 species in Britain. Genera 1; Acartophthalmus.
We advise against extracting comparative information from the descriptions. This is much more easily achieved using the DELTA data files or the interactive key, which allows access to the character list, illustrations, full and partial descriptions, diagnostic descriptions, differences and similarities between taxa, lists of taxa exhibiting or lacking specified attributes, and distributions of character states within any set of taxa. See also Guidelines for using data taken from Web publications.
Cite this publication as: ‘Watson, L., and Dallwitz, M.J. 2003 onwards. Insects of Britain and Ireland: the families of Diptera. Version: 14th April 2022. delta-intkey.com’.