Thread subject: Diptera.info :: Psychodidae Moth-fly/Owlet-midge

Posted by nick upton on 06-05-2010 13:13
#1

I finally got some half decent photos of these tiny 3-4mm mothlike flies, which normally lurk in the shadows in my garden, as one was sitting in cool evening sunshine yesterday.

I'm sure this is a difficult family, but can anyone help identify it at least to genus? I was surprised to find it appears to have sucking mouthparts in the third not very good shot, as mouthparts are meant to be non functional in most genera according to the Dipterists forum except in females of the Sycoracinae, which feed on amphibian blood, and the human blood feeding Phlebotominae or “sand flies” (an awful tropical curse that spread spreading leishmaniasis), but it doesn't look like a sandfly and I can't find any good images of Sycoracinae and am not sure these subfamilies are found in the UK. Maybe the mouthparts in the species i photographed are non-functional despite their size.

Wiltshire, southwest UK 5.5.10