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Hi,
I collected a caterpillar and waited to see what moth it turn to. but instead I got a surprise. this fly came out
Is it possible to identify?

Found today at Israel.

P.S title changed according to latest identification.

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And a nother view

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After rechecking the caterpillar photos I think I can identifiy the bite

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Siphona, but not the common one.

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great Siphona!!!

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Sorry, not Siphona ... looks more dexiine to me (long legs) and the proboscis is elongated but not long enough and not hinged to be Siphona. Would be nice to key the specimen through, if it has been kept and can be posted to me. I have never seen a tachinid quite like this before

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another surprise...

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Chris

You've highlighted exactly the features that troubled me about this fly, but I thought the only possiblities were Siphona and Prosena, and on balance I thought it looked more like Siphona. We await Theo's comments with extreme curiosity now.

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I have a feeling that it is going to be something that is rare in Europe and perhaps the location (Israel) points to something very southern in distribution. But it's a guess without keying it through the Central european or Palaearctic keys and I think it would be impossible to get very far confidently from these photos, so it would need the specimen on a pin It looks fairly distinctive though so perhaps Theo has seen one before?

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I agree, no Siphona, seems to be either Dexiini or Leskiini.
Can't tell whether the arista is plumose or bare, that would help.

On the other hand, nearly all Dexiini have hosts in Coleoptera.
Is this host a Lepidoptera-caterpillar ? Certainly looks like it.

In which case it gets more and more interesting.

Need to see the specimen, since it's from Israel, could be something bizarre to west-European standards.


Theo

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Hi,
I'm not usually collect insects so by now I guess this fly is searching himself new caterpillar
Maybe if I knew this sp. if so interesting I could had kept it.

Theo, I don't have a very good macro on the arista. does this help?

p.s Size was about 9mm

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Can't see the arista, but it helps, definitely NOT Dexiini.

So it must be somewhere in the Leskiini / Atylostoma-group.
Can you tell is the number of anterodorsal bristles on the mid tibia ?

Theo

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anterodorsal

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Looks like 1 to me from the top image.

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I'm not really familer the morphologic terms. thanks jorgemotalmeida
for the link but I still not fully understand what is anterodorsal?
If it is the hairs under the first leg ( right image ) it looks like 9 hairs. if it is the hairs under the dorsal near the first legs (left image) it seem there are ~3-4

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Here is the whole front leg with clear looks on bristles

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Zcuc

Theo wants to see the middle section of the middle leg. He needs to be able to see how many bristles there are pointing outwards and forwards.

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Ok,
I think I got it.

Top Image is left legs, second image right legs. It is hard to tell exactly the resolution is not that good. maybe 1-2 bristles on front leg and more on the other.

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It's a pity there is no specimen ... especially since you had good details of the host Tachinid + host data is very useful to help us understand what these insects do and what they depend on. If you can take a specimen I would be very interested to identify them for you - especially if they have host data.

To me it looks like 1 anterodorsal (forward-outer) bristle on the mid tibia - the bristle on the end of the tibia are called 'spurs'.

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Chris, Theo,

We had a very similar species before from Greece:

http://www.diptera.info/forum/viewthread.php?forum_id=5&thread_id=7144

And nobody responded then, probably to busy catching less interesting flies.

Maybe these beautifull pictures in this thread give additional information.
I do not recognize the species.

Liekele