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| Insects of Britain and Ireland: the families of Diptera |
~Sciomyzidae-Phaeomyiinae
Life style parasitic (in the larval stage); on millipedes.
Adult insects. Small. Not shining black. Antennae 3 segmented; ‘modified’; aristate. The second antennal segment not grooved. Ptilinal suture clearly defined. Post-vertical orbital bristles present (?); parallel, or divergent (?). Mouthparts functional. The maxillary palps 1 segmented; porrect. Vibrissae absent. Thorax without a continuous dorsal suture; without well defined posterior calli. Wings with a closed anal cell. The anal cell short. The costa unbroken. The leading edge veins not noticeably stronger than the rest. Tibiae with a dorsal pre-apical bristle. Hind tibiae without strong bristles in the basal 4/5.
Larvae and pupae. The larvae terrestrial; parasitic (on millipedes, by contrast with Sciomyzidae); acephalic. The pupae enclosed within a puparium.
Comments. Family distinguished from Sciomyzidae by differences in genital structure, and larval host range. This description is unreliable, being extrapolated from that of Sciomyzidae.
Classification. Suborder Brachycera; Division Muscomorpha Schizophora Acalyptratae; Superfamily Scyomyzoidea.
British representation. 2 species in Britain. Genera 1; Pelidnoptera.
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’.