Identification, Images, & Information
For Insects, Spiders & Their Kin
For the United States & Canada
Photo#486137
no idea here. - Hylobittacus apicalis

no idea here. - Hylobittacus apicalis
North of Griffy Lake, Monroe County, Indiana, USA
May 27, 2010
Size: size of a crane fly
I was hiking around looking for some crane flies and almost immediately fell onto this character. I was quite excited to find a crane fly so quickly, but then i realized something was quite off.

I mean...it's not ANY kind of fly...but what it IS, I surely don't know.

I took several crummier shots before i got this one...which is also crummy. It continually evaded me and would fly between 10 and 20 feet away and land on the far side of leaves and sticks. I was utterly charmed.

anyone know what i found?

Hangning Fly!
Thanks, all!
And as for the date, I'm fairly sure it was taken in late May, but it may have been taken as late as mid June. I'm sorry I can't be more specific.
Again, your attention to this was much appreciated.

-Sky

Moved
Moved from ID Request.

Cool!
Looks like a hangingfly, a type of scorpionfly (note the beak-like mouth)
Maybe something like this

 
Bittacidae: Hylobittacus apicalis, based on dark wingtips

nice find! pls add actual sighting date, if recorded

 
According to the EXIF data...
the picture was taken May 27, 2010 (at 2:21 pm). Of course, that's only as accurate as the date/time setting on the camera, which is often incorrect

 
What's EXIF data?
What's EXIF data and how can i find it on my photos?

 
EXIF Data
It's information that the camera automatically writes into the JPEG image file, which includes the state of the camera, including fstop, shutter speed, etc, as well as settings and other information that's programmed into the camera at the time at the image was taken.

Most photo-editing software has something in the menus to view camera info, and there are stand-alone utilities. I got an addon for Firefox that lets me examine EXIF data on web-page images, and that's what I used here.

 
HA!
There it is! I looked at my photo in Microsoft Office Picture Manager. There it is. I do know my camera's Date function to be accurate, so I trust this date. I'll go ahead and edit my post. Thanks, Chuck Entz!