The dark form of P. brachyrhychus seen here can be easily mis-identified as P. bulbirostris, or as the dark form of P. excisus...especially when only a dorsal view is available (and all the more so if the view is tilted so that the frons is not clearly visible).

But the profile view seen here clearly displays three important characters for verifying P. brachyrhynchus:

1) the entirely white cheeks; 2) the uniform-width white-pollinose pleural stripe...reaching from the lower edge of the pleuron (between the fore- and mid-legs) to the upper-edge of the thorax (just forward of the wing-base); and 3) the proboscis is short.
Both P. bulbirostris and P. excisus have dark markings on their cheeks. And in P. bulbirostris the upper half of the pleural stripe is absent; while in P. excisus the pleural stripe is complete, but the lower half is typically wider than the upper half.

Moved from Subgenus Pachyconops.

Moved from Physoconops.

Moved from Thick-headed Flies.