Oh! Just taken another look and it may be an Anthomyiidae - the anal vein reaches the wing edge. It doesn't have the usual small bristle on its hind metatarsus though, or at least it is not evident.
I think this is in genus Scaeva. It's a very dark individual and I can't see the abdomen markings clearly enough to be certain of a species, but I'd lean towards Scaeva pyrastri as a guess.
I'm not an expert in Empididae, but this looks like a good match for E. tumida. Are the palps more or less yellow? (The similar E. scotica has dark palps, and is more northern in distribution.) There are a couple of records on iRecord for May and June, although most are later in the year - see: https://irecord.org.uk/species-details?taxa_taxon_list_id=170357
I've only ever seen this species once, and it does seem to be uncommon.
Very nice photos! I'd agree with Clusiodes, and I suspect that you are probably correct with albimanus (which is the one I see most often), but as far as I'm aware these are best confirmed by dissection of the males, and I'm not sure how reliable the orbital bristle character is.
Hi both,
apologies for the delay in response, thanks Tony i do own both books, i have used them for the plates but not considered using the list of references, a do'h! moment... i shall go through them both and review the material. I have found a lot of books very hard to get hold of now due to age, i managed to get Kevin Smith phyisical copy from somone in Ireland who donated it to me after a library closed, the RES have a digital copy on their website though.
Martin - i have put a message out to ask other regions of England in my work place ( Environment Agency) to ask if anyone else comes across them can they send photos, i dont come across many in the north west in our work samples probably due to differing habitat preferences of our sites. I shall be in touch if anything comes of it.
Hi Neil,
I have been working on psychodidae for several years now. Are you interested taking them up? In which case email me on richardplane@btinternet.com
Richard
Hi everyone!
I am a 4th year Honours student, my project is investigating whether presence of wild boar has an effect on the abundance, taxa richness, and diversity of flying invertebrates in Dundreggan, Scotland. I've been analysing high-res photos of sticky traps which makes ID difficult since I can't manipulate the specimens under a microscope, which also limits the usefulness of ID guides. My aim is to ID all of my 26,888 specimens to family level, although my most abundant taxa I have to species and I have a few genus level ID's too.
There should be photos attached to this post (or the forum topic? I'm not sure, I am new here and this is my first post so please bare with me if anything is formatted incorrectly). I previously thought these specimens belonged to Megamerinidae, which only has one UK species, Megamerina dolium. I am no longer convinced that these specimens are M. dolium. Could anyone help with this ID?
Thank you for welcoming me into this community.
James
I'd agree with Anthomyiidae - the combination of pale hairs under the scutellum and the anal vein reaching wing margin is pretty diagnostic.
They are phoretic mites - possibly feeding, but more likely just hitching a ride to the next compost heap
Hi Arron, I've only just seen this thread so I'm not sure if you will see my very late reply! I'd be really interested in whether you are finding any larvae from the soldierflies group, the possibility you suggest for getting high quality photos would be fantastic. I've made a small start in gathering some information on the recording scheme page, but as yet I haven't got far with the aquatic species. Please do get in touch if this is of interest.