Thread subject: Diptera.info :: Diptera larva?

Posted by atylotus on 23-04-2010 10:24
#13

Looking at the photographs in Stuke (2004: downloadable from http://www.schweb...agidae.pdf) the larva isn't X. ater, but some other species. In the larvae of X. ater the third thoracic segment has a pair of large round sclerotized platelets, while in X. cinctus almost the entire third thoracic segment is sclerotized. Unfortunately it appears as if Stuke synonimize X. ater with X. compeditus. An assumption can me made regading the larva of these German specimens. As Cranefly pointed out, the adults are more like compeditus and the larva resemble that of ater. The larva of these german specimens lack the platelets on the third thoracic segment, so it couldn't be X. ater (refering to Stuke, 2004). So the assumption could be made that in X. compeditus the platelets are missing (in these German specimens), in X. ater they are large (as in the Czech specimens of Miroslav: http://www.dipter...d_id=19769) and in X. cinctus even larger with also a central sclerite.