Diptera.info

Posted by Jorn R Gustad on 29-04-2019 22:36

Male, ca 3,5 mm, netted 25th April (after an unusual warm week for the spring season) 20masl in a steep hillside with broad-leaved forest in middle of Norway, not far from a corpse of Red Deer Cervus elaphus. I am puzzled by this specimen, not at least from the patterned wing apex, but have found no matches yet. The specimen is collected and more views is possible. Regrettably I have no proper equipment for close-ups at the moment.

Any help appreciated, as always.

Cheers Jørn

Edited by Jorn R Gustad on 30-04-2019 20:20

Posted by Ectemnius on 30-04-2019 09:28

Hello Jørn,

Yes it is, Pseudseps signata, a male. And that is quite spectaculair as it is a generally scarce species in Europe. And above all, new to the fauna of Norway!
For more info and a nice photo of a living specimen see:
https://www.resea...d_Slovakia

Kind regards,

Ectemnius

Edited by Ectemnius on 30-04-2019 09:29

Posted by Jorn R Gustad on 30-04-2019 20:19

Thank you, Tony and Ectemnius,
I did not find any pictures with such wing clouding near wing tip and all yellow legs, so I suspected a different species. I just looked on the photo in the above mentioned link, not the text. What a shame. It is indeed mentioning sexual dichroism regarding leg colour, the males with all yellow legs. In addition, the clouds at the apices of R2+3, R4+5 and M are more prominent in males. In other words, full match. And I realized that I have only looked on females on the net...

According to the Norwegian species recording system Artskart, there are six records between 1981-1995, and a female recorded by me in 2014 at the very same spot as the above specimen. I see that Fauna Europaea (Ozerov, 2013) does not list the species as Norwegian, which is an obvious mishap. The six first records are determined by Lita Greve Jensen and are in the collection of the Natural History Museum in Oslo.

Cheers Jørn