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| Insects of Britain and Ireland: the families of Diptera |
Life style parasitic (the larvae being parasites of other arthropods).
Adult insects. Small. Antennae 2–6 segmented; ‘modified’; aristate; the arista dorsal (pubescent or shortly hairy). The second antennal segment distinctly grooved above. Ptilinal suture clearly defined. Eyes rounded, well separated (but close, in the males). Mouthparts functional; non-piercing (?). The maxillary palps 1 segmented; porrect. Thorax with the dorsal suture continuous across the middle; with well defined posterior calli. Hypopleural bristles present. Wings with a discal cell; with a closed anal cell. The anal cell short. Wings without a sharp bend in vein 4; with a well developed lower calypter (but this narrow); patterned, or unpatterned (sometimes heavily suffused or marked with dark colouring). Neither parasitic nor predatory (?).
Larvae and pupae. The larvae terrestrial; parasitic (on or in woodlice, beetles and spiders); endoparasitic, or ectoparasitic; acephalic. The pupae enclosed within a puparium.
Comments. Small, slender, darkish grey or black flies, never metallic.
Classification. Suborder Brachycera; Division Muscomorpha Schizophora Calyptratae; Superfamily Oestroidea.
British representation. 7 species in Britain. Genera 6; Melanophora, Paykullia, Phyto, Rhinophora, Stevenia, Tricogena.
Illustrations. • Melanophora roralis (from Walker). Melanophora roralis, with details of head in side view (11a), and antenna (11b). From Walker (1853, Plate XI), with 2mm scale added.
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’.
