Thread subject: Diptera.info :: Steganinae from Canary Islands -> Cacoxenus subg Gitonides
#1
Not my own photos, but I got permission by the observer to make the request here:
La Gomera, Sept 2023
Posted by
Andrzej on 23-09-2023 00:13
#2
It's a
Drosophila species:
repleta species-group
#3
I don't think so - the dark spots are too large, to manny bristles on the thorax and general shape says not a Drosophilid. Note also theremarkable eye stripe.
I was going into the direction of a
Cacoxenus species
#4
The arista is not long haired, so Cacoxenus might come in to mind, but it is not a species I know. Maybe an introduced species?
#5
Cacoxenus perspicax is described to have a horizontal bar in the eyes
#6
That fly can be a Phortica (subg. Sinophthalmus) sp. It is not P. (S.) picta which I know. Except of P. (S.) picta there is one more described P. (S.) species, one described subspecies and a number of not yet studied taxa. Distribution from SW USA to S. America. Also I do not exclude Cacoxenus (subg. Gitonides). If the specimen is available, I would like to study it, also I can arrange its DNA sequencing (most of its body can stay preserved if needed so).
#7
unfortunately the fly hasn't been caught.
I had excluded
Phortica because the antennae do not seem to be plumose
Posted by
Andrzej on 24-09-2023 10:33
#8
Really, the arista is rather bare or short pubescent... Maybe we should check the key to the Afrotropical genera?
#9
Both P. (Sinophthalmus) and C. (Giitonides) have micropubescet arista. Still you are right with C. (Gitonides) - after consultation of literature I realized that some characters testify for its affiliation to C. (Gitonides) (lacking frontal keel, costa developed only up to r2+3). Maybe you are even right with C. (G.) perspicax, still unrecorded from Canary Islands, but note that there are more than ten species of C. (G.) in Africa - e. g. C.(G.) apidoxenus, described from Senegal...
#10
Thanks for the detailed information!