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I put up a Bibio on my site, today. Anyone have any ideas about an id? Is there a decent key for Bibios?

http://homepage.e.../nov02.htm

I reckon I have half a dozen species on my patch. (Though not all at the same time)

Any help welcome.

Stuart

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There are two Irish species active in autumn, B. lepidus and B. clavipes. Both have entirely black males, but in former the stigma in the wing should be dark and distinct, in the latter more vague and less dark. In various discussions with some people knowledgable about Bibionidae we never could decide whether these two represented real species or a darker and a paler form of the same species.

For the moment, let's keep this one in the books as B. lepidus (because from the picture the stigma appears to be dark and distinct).

The key to use is the one on Bibionidae and Scatopsidae by Freeman and Lane (1985) in the series Handbooks for the Identification of British Insects 9(7).

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Thanks, Paul.

You appear to have distribution information for Ireland. Is this generally available? It would help my identifications if I knew the subset of species I should be considering.

Stuart

http://homepage.eircom.net/~hedgerow2

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Peter Chandler's Diptera checklist of the British Isles (1998) includes all known data about the occurrence of Diptera in Ireland. All species listed there with an '+' added are known from Ireland too, the ones with '++' added were not yet recorded from the British Isles but were found in Britian.

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Thanks for that. Do you fancy trying some of my other Bibios?

http://homepage.e.../may13.htm

http://homepage.e...july26.htm

http://homepage.e.../apr28.htm (which I think is Bibio marci)

All the best,

Stuart

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Unless someone has better ideas, my guess for the specimens of 13 May is Bibio hortulanus, the specimen of 26 July resembles the B. pomonae (conspicuous red femora) and the 28 April specimen is not B. marci but I suspect B. ferruginatus.

The latter cannot be B. marci because the basal part of vein R4+5 is about equal in length to the crossvein r-m. In the right wing of the pictured fly you look slightly more to the base of the wing and you will see two veins meeting in the direction from the base of the wing to the tip of the wing. These two dark parts are of similar length. In B. marci the posterior one should be about twice as long.

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Concerning the specimens from 13 may:
it cannot be hortulanus because the female of hortulanus is completely orange. It definitely looks like Bibio marci, male thorax with all black hairs.

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The Bibio pomonae is definitely correct.
It is only known, as far as I know, in Ireland from Kerry and the Burren.
The ferruginatus should have really completely black tibiae.
It looks like it in the picture, but somehow (the long hairs on first tergites) the pictures suggests lanigerus to me.
So check for yourself: really black tibiae implies ferrigunatus and
red tibiae lanigerus

Theo Zeegers