British Insects: the Families of Diptera
| British Insects: the Families of Diptera | |
Rhyphidae, Phryneidae, Sylvicolidae.
Gnat-like flies.
Adult insects. Small to medium-sized; slender-bodied to robustly-built; stilt-legged, or not stilt-legged. Antennae 8–16 segmented; ‘simple’. Antennae not aristate. Ocelli present; 3. Eyes meeting above the antennae (often, in males), or not meeting. The maxillary palps 3–5 segmented; drooping. Vibrissae absent. Thorax without a continuous dorsal suture. Wings with a discal cell; without a sub-apical cell; without a closed anal cell. The costa not extending around the entire wing. Sub-costa apparent; reaching the costa independently of vein 1. Vein 6 present; reaching the wing margin. Vein 7 present; falling short of the wing margin. Wings with the lower calypter much reduced or absent; patterned (mottled). Tibiae spurred (apically).
Larvae and pupae. Larvae more or less aquatic, or terrestrial; saprophagous, or coprophagous, or consuming stored produce (sometimes in honeycombs, cider and wine); eucephalic. Pupa without a puparium.
Comments. Flies sometimes dancing in swarms.
Classification. Suborder Nematocera; Division Psychodomorpha; Superfamily Anisopodoidea.
British representation: Genera 1; 4 species.
Illustrations: • Sylvicola fenestralis (Domestic Gnat-like fly: B. Ent. 102). • Sylvicola fenestralis (detail: B. Ent. 102). • Sylvicola fenestralis (dissections: B. Ent. 102). • Sylvicola fenestralis (B. Ent. 102, legend+text). • Sylvicola cinctus (from Walker).
To view the illustrations with detailed captions, go to the interactive key. This also offers 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.
Cite this publication as: ‘Watson, L., and Dallwitz, M.J. 2003 onwards. British insects: the families of Diptera. Version: 9th April 2007. http://delta-intkey.com’.
