General discussion

Does anyone have a spare copy of Collin's 1948 paper, 'A SHORT SYNOPSIS OF THE BRITISH SAPROMYZIDAE (DIPTERA)' ?  I'd welcome a sight of it.

Thanks.

AFB

Can anyone help me with this Lauxaniid, which keys out I think in Laurence Clemons' key as Sapromyza albiceps but confirmation would be helpful.  It has a strong lateral intra-alar, no black spots but brownish areas on the outer abdominal segments, arista pubescent, no thoracic stripes, little or no darkening on 3rd antennal segment, palps or wings, and frons not whitened.  A lovely little fly but delicate when dry and fell apart too easily, so no further examination possible

What do we know about the Chloropids?   I have a specimen of Elachiptera but no sure means of getting further. Thorax and abdomen black, thorax marked with punctures, no visible spines on the scutellum, head and legs yellow except for black or darkened femora.  There seem to be 8 British species.  Two photos attached.  I'd be glad for some guidance.

The Dipterists Forum holds an annual weekend course at the Preston Montford field studies centre near Shrewsbury. These courses cover selected families of flies in detail, and the 2021 course will be about the Muscidae, a large and important family of flies which utilise a large range of habitats. It will take place from Friday 19 to Sunday 21 February.

I've been asked to comment on this fly, which was found at Nursling near Southampton, Hampshire, on 5th July. I'm not competent in these Families, and would appreciate some input. Using Oosterbrook, it seemed to be coming out at Mycetobiidae with the basal cell arrangement, but I dismissed this on other grounds. I then had trouble working out the relations of CuA1 and the stem of M, and the relationship between A1 and the wing margin is out-of-view. At that point I must confess that I thought it looked a bit like Keroplatidae I'd seen in the past.......not a great way to identify flies!

This little 2mm beastie showed up in my net in mid-June from a hedgerow sweep.  It sems to key out as a Chloropid, and seems very reminiscent of the Thaumatomyia that show up around here later in the year, except that in this case the costa goes as far as vein M1+2.  Mostly yellow but with sharp black markings, including the ocellar triangle and the base of the hind tibia.  I want to say Chloropid but the experts may like to differ.  Unfortunately it was too small for me to pin with ease and in carding it the specimen landed upside down!

It's a while since we changed the set of photos on the home page, so if anyone is willing to share one or two of your 'best fly photos' for us to showcase on the home page that would be great. We tend to stick to close-up images of individual flies, and it's good to get a variety of different families represented.

Recently I was sent pictures of a suspected hoverfly larva.  I notice that Dipterists Digest 1st Series issue 9 was on this topic.  Is this still available?

What do we know about this little known (or little written about) family.  I have some small - 2 to 3 mm - flies that congregate on the leaves of my pond plants.  They key out pretty unambiguously to key 93b in the Ball/Ismay keys.  They are slightly dark green shining, which made me guess they were Dolis; I then noted that Collyer & Hammond use the phrase 'allied to Drosophilidae.'  My photos may give an idea.  I'd be glad to have some guidance.