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Hi,
This night I had a male guest in my bathroom. My first impression was Asilidae, but then I thought: these tender feet are not made for catching prey - so Therevidae. The so often cited key led to Acrosathe, which I supposed to be much woolier. So is this a rather unhairy Acrosathe annulata male? I tried hard to find an av on femur 2, maybe in the smallest picture there is a shadow of it visible. A. baltica without av is not known from Berlin.
Confirmation or correction of my ID is highly appreciated! Regards, Sundew

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More pics.

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I'm agree with you. It's a little bald A. annulata male.

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About the av seta in femur II : I see that in the collage photo.

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Looks like the male of THereva cinifera to me. Did you consider that ?


Theo

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Nope, because of halteres. Here are pale, while should be dark to fit your guess

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...but if there's chance of variability in halters, and maybe is the case, I'm going to follow your tip

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This male not silvery, so it can't be Acrosathe, which is extremely silvery (you need sunglasses to look at it ).
The halter is an issue indeed: it is totally dark in my male cinifera (n=1) and totally yellow in my male fulva (n=1). According to Stubbs, it is ' totally or partially dark' in cinifera. That would fit this one.
Moreover, I don't expect fulva around Berlin, but I could be mistaken.

My conclusion: likely male cinifera.

Theo

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I should better stop to post Therevidae :S
Of course, I did not choose the key option "Male with abdominal hairs brown to black (not predominantly silver).", so I did not consider Thereva.
Now, trying the key for male Therevas, I have to decide whether there is "Femur 1-2 with a few bristles below at the tip" - difficult to say, I have a lot of pics but see hairs only. Without bristles it would be T. oculata... Given that there are bristles hidden between the hairs and not protruding, we would reach T. cinifera/fulva. As you, dear Theo, identified my T. fulva couple from Berlin some years ago (http://www.dipter...d_id=31414), and as T. fulva is listed for Berlin/Brandenburg (http://www.orion-...liegen.pdf), we cannot exclude it, though I find the habitus very different (at least as different as a "normal" Acrosathe). I could not find a picture of T. cinifera and absolutely rely on your conclusion that a male cinifera can look this way, even if the halter knob is yellow.
Thanks for all efforts!

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|t yes I agree, it looks for sure more like a Thereva. I know the limits of keys and descriptions, and know that some patterns are not described... and moreover, there can be intermediate characters or, worse, even mutants (keys are static, genes aren't). So, whatever it is, it is. I guess that there is still much to write about this family.

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That is very interesting, Claudia. Even my memory is finite, i had totally forgotten about the other post.
Still, I think we can all agree that the other male is eight times as orange as this one. General jizz is very Thereva cinifera. I would have liked a dark halter to be dead sure, but it is at least partly darkened.....

Therevidae are :o:@:@:@

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Oh, genitalia are distinct, so if you did collect it, we might still have a chance in the rebound.....


Theo

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When I asked the little male for his genitalia, he said: :o:@:@:@ (which I found quite comprehensible), and actually we met at 3.30 a.m. ... He was glad to leave my bathroom in a covered glass, and I let him out with my eyes half shut already. May he father many photogenic Thereva cinifera babies!
Meanwhile I also found pics of the species (http://flickrhive...ra,thereva, http://www.boldsy...xid=483646) - looks fine!