Thread subject: Diptera.info :: Micropezidae Neria longiceps

Posted by Paul Beuk on 08-01-2020 15:29
#8

With specimens under the microscope it took a little digging but in the end it was your own key that pointed me in the right sirection, Darwyn. The scutellar setae not being at the adge of the scutellum lead me to 'Calobatella longiceps'. Checking further literature I found it is now in the genus Neria.
I also checked Ozerov's 1991 paper synonymizing Calobatella with Neria, but I could find no illustration of the male genitalia. The descriptions are generally useful but somewhat misleading is that none of the descriptions seem to mention that the hind tibiae at least have an anterior and posterior dark stripe along the whole length but that these stripes are often fused, resulting in all darkish hind tibiae.
Ozerov's paper (and I read it somewhere, too) suggest that in lateral view the eyes may be somewhat triangular, but that is not the case in any of the specimens I have seen.
The hind femora in the photographed specimen show just the slightest darkening before the preapical band. The extend of this darkening is very variable in the specimens sent.
Apparently the species had not been recorded froim Austria before but it was found in many of the surrounding countries (not in Switzerland and Italy).