Moved from Physoconops weemsi.

I was too caught up in thinking all the "tricky" Florida taxa were all among floridanus, weemsi, excisus and perhaps townsendi. But those are all in subgenus Pachyconops, and thus lack the small triangular indentation on the hind margin of the eye (just above the "half-way" up). That triangular indentation indicates subgenus Physoconops...and I realized last night the P. fronto does indeed occur in Florida, and seemed a good candidate.

So I went through the key in Camras (1955) and also read Williston's description and they both fit this pair to a tee. No doubt these two are P. fronto.

(Which means, now more than ever, we need to get contributors out in the field searching for P. weemsi...the only Conopinae species still not represented on BugGuide!)

Moved from Subgenus Pachyconops.

I've been mulling over the ID possibilities here for a long time. It's been down to P. floridanus or P. weemsi for a while (the lack of a postvertical pollinose stripe rules out both P. excisus and P. townsendi).

A number of characters have swayed me to the belief that the species here is P. weemsi:

1) In P. floridanus, the theca is black and "distinctly longer" than the height of the abdominal segment it's attached to. But that's not the case here...the female's theca is fully extended and can be seen to be roughly equal in length to its tergite. And the theca is also dark red. Both these characters fit the description for P. weemsi (cf. Camras (2007)).

2) The face and cheeks of in P. floridanus are described as reddish. But on the male and female here the face and cheeks appear whitish, not reddish...in accordance with the description of P. weemsi.

3) While the description of the holotype of P. weemsi in Camras (2007) gives the color as "mainly yellow on segents 1 to 4, then mainly black", the remarks following the holotype description state that the allotype is "more richly colored with rufous on many areas instead of yellow", which is in accord with the individuals here.

4) In the description of P. floridanus in Camras (1955), it's stated that P. floridanus has: "Triangular mark on posterior margin of eye practically absent." But, contrary to that description, the triangular mark on the posterior margin of the eye is fairly prominent on both the male and female here.

It should be noted that I have not had the opportunity to see curated specimens of P. weemsi or P. floridanus, so my ID here is based solely on my best efforts at interpreting the literature (and there's not much I've found on these two species beyond the two references I linked to above). But I may be visiting Florida in the coming year...and if so, I hope to be able to visit a museum collection with specimens of these two species (and other southeastern Conopinae). In fact, I'd really like to see live individuals of both species in the field if possible!

At any rate, for those who may live in Florida and have access to visiting a museum and studying curated specimens of P. weemsi and P. floridanus, I'd be thrilled to get your feedback, corrections, or confirmation on the ID I've arrived a here using the literature.

Moved from Physoconops.

Moved from Conopinae.

This is somewhat of a "Physocephala sagittaria/texana look-alike"...but the uniform thickness of the hind femora; long 3rd antennal segment; and thoroughly black tarsi with long yellow pulvilli...all indicate it is a Physoconops rather than a Physocephala.

There are a few other similar posts from Florida and I think they may be Physoconops floridanus (which is not to be confused with Physocephala floridana). But I haven't gotten to around to seriously trying to grok Physoconops yet.

Kara, if you happen to have any additional frontal and/or dorsal views of this pair, and you could add them to this series...that might help quite a bit when someone (perhaps me) gets around to trying to identify these to species.

Nice photo and neat conopids!