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Home » Guide » Arthropods (Arthropoda) » Hexapods (Hexapoda) » Insects (Insecta) » Flies (Diptera) » "Acalyptratae" » Sciomyzoidea » Thick-headed Flies (Conopidae) » Conopinae » Physocephala » Physocephala sagittaria
Photo#322218
Fly ID - Physocephala sagittaria
Copyright © 2009 Scott Justis

Fly ID - Physocephala sagittaria
Norfolk, Virginia, USA
August 16, 2009
Size: ~7mm (est.)
A wasp mimic syrphid fly?

Images of this individual: tag all
Fly ID - Physocephala sagittaria Fly ID - Physocephala sagittaria
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Contributed by Scott Justis on 19 August, 2009 - 9:20am
Last updated 28 December, 2013 - 6:24am

Moved
Moved from Physocephala.
… Aaron Schusteff, 28 December, 2013 - 6:24am login or register to post comments

Beautiful images, Scott!
And, using the key in Camras 1996, this goes to P. sagitarria...which has been somewhat of a "mystery species" among the 7 in the genus up to now, with no reference images that I could find on the web.

The critical key characters here are the "mainly pale frons", "dark discal cell", and (barely discernible here) "dark facial grooves". There's only one couplet where the sailing is not smooth based on the images here, and that's "cheeks uniformly dark" vs. "cheeks paler in middle". The latter is presumably what holds here, as the alternative leads to P. tibialis...and this is definitely not that species.

Below is an image showing the cheeks in a curated specimen of P. sagitarria, also from Virginia:



If, by chance, you do have any additional images showing the cheek it would be great if you could add one to this series...to directly verify all steps in ID process.

At any rate, thanks for the nice post...and good find!!
… Aaron Schusteff, 28 December, 2013 - 6:23am login or register to post comments

 
Thanks!
I'll have to dig deep for this one :^) When I get some time I will see what can be found.
… Scott Justis, 28 December, 2013 - 9:40am login or register to post comments

Moved
Moved from Thick-headed Flies.
… Martin Hauser, 10 July, 2011 - 1:06am login or register to post comments

Moved
Moved from ID Request.
… Scott Justis, 19 August, 2009 - 10:37am login or register to post comments

Thick-headed fly
Family Conopidae.
… Eric R. Eaton, 19 August, 2009 - 9:25am login or register to post comments

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