Toadstool Fly
S2, dorsal
Toadstool Fly
S2, profile
| Toadstool Fly S2, dorsal | | Toadstool Fly S2, profile | | ||
 | Class: | Animals (Animalia) - Jointed Legs (Arthropoda) - Insects (Insecta) | |||
| Order: | Flies (Diptera) | ||||
| Family: | Toadstool Fly (Heteromyzidae) iNaturalist Observation | ||||
| Species: | Toadstool Fly (Tapeigaster paramonovi) | ||||
| This Photo: | S1, profile | ||||
Thank you Tony Daley for identifying this species for us General Species Information: Found in the Adelaide Hills and possibly elsewhere The mushroom S1 was sitting was measured later and estimate it's length to be ~6mm. When we id'ed S1 as this species, we thought S2 was T. digitata but Tony kindly reviewed our findings and determined they were both the T. paramonovi. What is telling is that we thought S1 & S2 were the same fly, taken within 20 sec of each other. Now that is still possible and the differences showing are camera artifacts. We mention these errors & our reasons below to highlight the difficulty in id'ing inverts to species and how expert opinion really is necessary with most inverts to get to species level. The patch around the ocelli seems different. We noticed, however, there are many areas covered in very fine reflective felt/hair. As such, camera angle shows different colours. McAlpine & Kent's paper from 1982 states that T. digitata & T. paramonovi are "Closely related": T. paramonovi has "whitish pruinescence along orbital margins" T. digitata has "ocellar spot black" There are also other differences related to leg colour, etc. Tony said " In McAlpine's key (1982) T. digitata is split from the former species by the lack of mesonotum stripes and all tibiae with a black band above the middle and at apex. In the fly here, and as described for T. paramonovi, the fore tibiae has (only) the apical half or so darkened which appears to be unique among the genus, ie from middle to apex dark. My interpretation of ocelli spot colour for T. paramonovi from McAlpine's description is that it is also blackish by the lack of mention of colour when comparing to T. digitata, but instead differs from the latter by having it more or less dusted with whitish pruinescence." | |||||
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