---

Can anyone help to identify this smallish, very worn out bristly fly, a tachinid I presume, though many of its wings veins are missing! Amazed it could still fly in this condition.

12th June 2010 Wiltshire UK, c 7mm feeding on Hogweed

---

Hi, Nick!

I think, you should have a look at the very last page of the Tachinidae section in the gallery...

---

Another Zophomyia temula.

---

Ups... I see, I have responded to a double posting, which has already been replied on...

---

I only saw this fly once. It is not so common here..

---

Hi, Jorge!



It is not very numerous here, but I find it regularly in early summer.
http://insektenfo...eadid=7895

---

Many thanks Juergen and Jorge. Dunno how this got posted twice, but good that you didn't even need the 2nd, better photo on the one Theo reacted to. Sorry, I didn't make it to the last page of the photo gallery to find the pics of this one....Happy New Year to all!

---

Yeah, they are incredibly common in one locality near me (grazing meadows with deciduous woodland surrounding, in Berkshire) but I haven't seen them very often elsewhere. "Locally Common", I think the phrase might be :)

---

Thanks Chris. i came across some info http://www.essexf...a%20temula and http://www.radstockactiongroup.org.uk/.../priority_species_radstock_railway_land. pdf suggesting the species is nationally scarce, but judging by the number I saw, I'd agree with "locally common", this time in a small patch of calcareous grassland - ungrazed common land - near woodland. The Essex field clubs says this of it: Its host is unknown, but localities include woodland, calcareous grassland and coastal dunes (Falk, in press)

---

Yeah, I'd agree with calcareous grassland - I have seen them on a local chalk downland site occasionally. The site where I have seen most though is this wet, flower-rich grazing meadow area next to a river and deciduous woodland. So, my guess is that we just don't have enough information to work on to be sure of the requirements ... but we could say the same about virtually all of the tachinids! :D

The Essex Field Club look to have lifted that phrase from my site ... or from a copy of Steve Falk's JNCC report that was never officially published, where I got it ;) Steve was happy for the content to be made available as JNCC didn't seem keen to publish the whole report.

My dream is that one day someone will actually pay someone (me?) to computerise all the data from the old museum specimens scattered around the country - it is a lot of work but that would give us historic localities and allow us to better form a picture of population rise or (more likely) fall.

---

I think high grassland with much structure is the key ingredient here: if it was only chalky grasslands, the species would be very rare and local in The Netherlands (which it is not).


Theo

---

Maybe you could subvert some lottery funds somehow, Chris! I'm sure you'd find many species declining, but maybe some new species form further south as well, unless this last December has reversed that trend..

---

Would be nice - I got one grant for the Big lottery Fund, via OPAL in 2009 and I am keeping my fingers crossed that I will be able to apply again this month for another project. :) But it isn't possible to get funds for on-going research from the National Lottery - they prefer to fund capital schemes, not salaries and ongoing research :(

---

OK good luck. I'm sure you'd get lots of good references. Let me know if you ever need one! I'm no specialist, but as a generalist zoologist, I know the value of them!

---

Thanks - much appreciated :D

I will be applying to OPAL again so they know and trust me ... but I will go up against a lot of other needy wildlife organisations so I just hope that mine stands out as worthy of support :)