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| Insects of Britain and Ireland: the families of Diptera |
Gnats, Ghost-larvae, Phantom-larvae.
Adult insects. Slender-bodied; stilt-legged. Antennae 13 segmented; ‘simple’, or ‘modified’ (being plumed in males). Ocelli absent. Mouthparts functional, or non-functional; non-piercing (short, poorly developed). Mandibles present. Mandibles not in the form of long, slender, piercing stylets. The maxillary palps 3–5 segmented; drooping. Thorax without a continuous dorsal suture (i.e., without the V-shaped suture of the Tipulidae). Wing veins reaching the margin 10. Wings without a discal cell; without a sub-apical cell; without a closed anal cell. The costa not extending around the entire wing. The leading edge veins not noticeably stronger than the rest. Wing vein 6 present; reaching the wing margin (?). Wings with the lower calypter much reduced or absent.
Larvae and pupae. The larvae aquatic; predatory (especially on small crustaceans); eucephalic. The pupae without a puparium.
Classification. Suborder Nematocera; Division Culicomorpha; Superfamily Culicoidea.
British representation. 6 species in Britain. Genera 2; Chaoborus, Mochlonyx.
Illustrations. • Chaoborus crystallinus and Mochlonyx velutinus (from Walker). 9, Chaoborus crystallinus, male and (9a) antenna of female. 10, Mochlonyx velutinus, male: antenna (10a), wing (10b) and tip of hind tarsus (10c). From Walker (1856, Plate XXV), with 2mm scale added. • Chaoborus crystallinus: as Corethra plumicornis, Stephens 1846.
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’.
