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I've been having difficulties with this specimen, so after several hours feel I should get expert help! The discal cell is reminicent of Dolichopodidae, but it's not metalic and I can't get it to key out satisfactorily. Quite frankly, I suspect it belongs in another family, but I can't work out which.

Total length including wings is about 4 mm. It was swept from Trewalkin Meadow, a wet lowland meadow near Talgarth, Breconshire, on 25-7-2018.

I think this one keys out to Calliopum geniculatum in Mark Mitchell's Lauxaniid key of 2012.  I'd be glad to be corrected.

This lady keys out to Xanthandrus comptus, but has all yellow legs (barring only the hind metatarsus).  Otherwise the match is sound - elongated stigma, tergites 3 and 4 with square abdominal spots touching the front and edges of the segments, black scutellum).  But the legs are exceptionally yellow.  Any ideas?

Hello,

I hope a muscid enthusiast can help with this identification. The nearest I can get with the Fonseca keys is Helina lasiophthalma, but I am not convinced. A notable feature is the reddish tip to the scutellum. Length 7.0 mm. It was caught at a lit window on 31 Oct last year in SW Worcestershire (SO777339).

Martin Skirrow ('Screw')

I would like to place this fly in a family, but it has developed a nice coating of fungus that obscures much of the head and thorax and I can't get anywhere with it though the venation seems extreme and the antennae long ... I can't see if occeli are there or not, nor decide if there is a discal cell which doesn't help! Any clues to point me in the right direction? Thanks, Donald

This robust sized leftovers of  fly - a Muscid (I think - no hypopleural bristles) was in a sample collected from a conservatory last summer. I don't think there is much chance of putting a name to it, but the crossvein Dm-Cu is rather unusual in its shape. Does this point to any species? I have not seen it before.

Three times this year already, and once a year or so ago, I have taken Pherbellia ventralis from different Roe Deer corpses at the same time as taking multiple specimens of the Heleomyzid Neoleria ruficauda. These have all been within conifer plantation on lowland heath. The basic appearance of the two is superficially very similar and only under the microscope have I discovered the Sciomyzid interlopers. Presumably the similarity is coincidence, but what is the Pherbellia doing on the corpse?

Pherbellia ventralis