Identification, Images, & Information
For Insects, Spiders & Their Kin
For the United States & Canada
 

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Genus Medetera

Representative Images

Long-legged Fly - Medetera - female small fly attracted to porch light - Medetera fly - Medetera woodpecker fly - Medetera - male fly - Medetera - female Medetera from Massachusetts - Medetera Diptera - Medetera Fly - Medetera

Classification

Kingdom Animalia (Animals)
Phylum Arthropoda (Arthropods)
Subphylum Hexapoda (Hexapods)
Class Insecta (Insects)
Order Diptera (Flies)
No Taxon (Orthorrhapha)
Superfamily Empidoidea
Family Dolichopodidae (Longlegged Flies)
Subfamily Medeterinae
Genus Medetera

Other Common Names

Woodpecker Flies

Synonyms and other taxonomic changes

revised in(1)

Explanation of Names

Medetera Fischer von Waldheim 1819

Numbers

~50 spp. in our area, hundreds total

Identification

"The genus has a distinctive habitus, which with little practice is easily recognized, even by the unaided eye. In addition to its characteristic stance in life, the combination of the heavily sclerotized proboscis, strongly flattened mesoscutum, and the distinctive arch of both R4+5 and M enables one to spot the genus at a glance." (Bickel 1985)

Food

Larvae usually eat larvae of bark beetles (Scolytinae). Adults eat a wide variety of soft-bodied arthropods.

Internet References

Specimen images
Hunting behavior of M. jacula (Vikhrev 2007)

Works Cited

1.A revision of the Nearctic Medetera (Diptera, Dolichopodidae)
Bickel D.J. 1985. USDA Tech. Bull. 1692. 109 pp.
Contributed by tom murray on 5 October, 2005 - 7:24am
Additional contributions by Beatriz Moisset, Vox Sciurorum, v belov
Last updated 3 July, 2017 - 1:35pm

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