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A friend found in a cave in central Switzerland, 300 m under earth, in a little lake a dead fly (photo). The fly is about 2 mm long, and there its no open way out of this cave. The me sure of the cave its about 27 km. Date of the photo: CH, Melchsee-Frutt, 13/4/2012. Is it possible, to ID this fly? In my opinion, it is not an Fly, that lives in caves.

Thank you very much.
Andre

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Difficult to be certain but it might well be Heleomyzidae.

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Or Piophilidae, and I agree - it does not look like a cave-dwelling species.

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Thank you, Tony, for your help.

Cheers
André

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Could it have been washed into the cave through an underground stream that surfaced higher up the flow?

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Really difficult to say which family it is ! Wings are similar rather to those known in Piophilidae than Heleomyzidae ...

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Thank you, Andrzej. Is it possible to ID the fly (that's part of it- the wing, body) in alcohol? Ev. with DNA?

Thank you for your answer
André

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Hallo Chris

Could it have been washed into the cave through an underground stream that surfaced higher up the flow?

This could be possible, but the experts are not sure and they don't know, where the water comes from.

Cheers
Andre

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[quote]Andre Megroz wrote:
Is it possible to ID the fly (that's part of it- the wing, body) in alcohol?

It looks like a male, so should be able to be identified from the genitalia.

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Thank you, Tony, I'll look for a specialist in CH.

Greetings
Andre

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If the pieces are all together any number of us here could do it, but you might try Bernhard Merz in Geneva.

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Thank you, Paul, for the address.

Andre