Phaonia pallida

Phaonia pallida, the muscid fly or orange muscid fly, is a species of fly in the family Muscidae.[1]

Phaonia pallida
Phaonia pallida. Female
Scientific classification
Kingdom:
Animalia
Phylum:
Arthropoda
Class:
Insecta
Order:
Diptera
Family:
Muscidae
Genus:
Phaonia
Species:
P. pallida
Binomial name
Phaonia pallida
(Fabricius, 1787)
Synonyms
  • Musca pallida Fabricius, 1787
  • Aricia dorsalis Schnabl, 1888
  • Rohrella dorsalis Robineau-Desvoidy, 1830
  • Rohrella fragili s Robineau-Desvoidy, 1830

Distribution and habitat

This species is distributed across parts the Palaearctic ecozone (Europe: (incl. Sicily), Russia: Asia: Israel, Turkey, Iran; Azores).[2][3] These flies mainly inhabit deciduous forests and woodland, especially spruce forest edge.[4][5]

Description
Male

Phaonia pallida can reach a length of about 5.5–7.9 millimetres (0.22–0.31 in). These flies have an orange body with a very hairy thorax.[4][5] The antennae are composed by three articles and bear a feathery arista. The legs and the balancers are yellow, while the tarsi are black. The eyes are dark red, separated by a yellow marking in the females, while in males they are very close to each other.[6]

Biology

Adults fly from May to September, feeding on nectar of flowers (especially of Heracleum sphondylium).[4][5][6] Its larvae have been found growing in various fungi (Amanita rubescens, Clitocybe nebularis, Paralepista flaccida, Xerula radicata, Hymenopellis radicata, Amanita muscaria) [6] but also in rotten wood and under tree bark.[5][7] The last larval instar of Phaonia pallida is carnivorous, feeding on small insects.[5][8]

Bibliography
  • Chandler, Peter J. (2010). A Dipterist's Handbook (2nd Edition). The Amateur Entomologist. 15. Orpington, Kent, England: Amateur Entomologists' Society. pp. 525pp
  • D'Assis Fonseca, E.C.M (1968). Diptera Cyclorrhapha Calyptrata: Muscidae. Handbooks for the Identification of British Insects. 10. London.: Royal Entomological Society of London. pp. 118pp.
  • Gregor, F.; Rozkosny, R.; Bartak, M.; Vanhara, J. (2002). The Muscidae (Diptera) of Central Europe. Scientiarum Naturalium Universitatis Masarykianae Brunensis. 107. Masaryk.: Masaryk University. pp. 280pp.
gollark: Unfortunately, the slippery slope thing does actually *happen*, a lot.
gollark: Amazingly enough, there is often space between "do nothing" and "go massively overboard".
gollark: They should at least ban unvaccinated people from, say, schools.
gollark: Linux permissions are, honestly, not much use in desktop environments, since if an attack on a program gets it to run arbitrary code as your user, it can still access your files and stuff. All it can't do is poke at the system files (owned by root).
gollark: There should probably be a company which does that with some sort of witty name.

References
  1. BioLib
  2. Catalogue of life
  3. Fauna europaea
  4. Nature Spot
  5. J.K. Lindsey Commanster
  6. Un monde dans mon jardin
  7. Chandler, Peter J. (2010). A Dipterist's Handbook (2nd Edition). The Amateur Entomologist. 15. Orpington, Kent, England: Amateur Entomologists' Society. pp. 525pp.
  8. Jan Sevck Diptera (excluding Mycetophilidae S. str.) associated with fungi in Czech and Slovak Republics: a survey of rearing records from 1998-2000


This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.