''Merodon'' is a large genus of

bee Bees are winged insects closely related to wasps and ants, known for their roles in pollination and, in the case of the best-known bee species, the western honey bee, for producing honey. Bees are a monophyly, monophyletic lineage within the ...

-like

hoverflies Hover flies, also called flower flies or syrphid flies, make up the insect family Syrphidae. As their common name suggests, they are often seen hovering or nectaring at flowers; the adults of many species feed mainly on nectar and pollen, whi ...

. The majority of the species are centered on the

Mediterranean The Mediterranean Sea is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean Basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Western and Southern Europe and Anatolia, on the south by North Africa, and on th ...

and it is the second largest hoverfly genus in

Europe Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a subcontinent of Eurasia and it is located enti ...

with more than 50 European species. It is distributed over the

Palaearctic The Palearctic or Palaearctic is the largest of the eight biogeographic realms of the Earth. It stretches across all of Eurasia north of the foothills of the Himalayas, and North Africa. The realm consists of several bioregions: the Euro-Si ...

and Afrotropical realms, with most European species occurring in Southern and

Eastern Europe Eastern Europe is a subregion of the European continent. As a largely ambiguous term, it has a wide range of geopolitical, geographical, ethnic, cultural, and socio-economic connotations. The vast majority of the region is covered by Russia, wh ...

. The centre of distribution of this genus appears to be Turkey, where about 65 species have been recorded. Some species occur in Africa (Morocco through East Africa and Ghana to South Africa) and the middle East, as far as Pakistan. Given the rate at which new species have been recorded over the past decades, the worldwide number of species could exceed 200. The

larva A larva (; plural larvae ) is a distinct juvenile form many animals undergo before metamorphosis into adults. Animals with indirect development such as insects, amphibians, or cnidarians typically have a larval phase of their life cycle. Th ...

e feed on the bulbs or rhizomes of

monocotyledon Monocotyledons (), commonly referred to as monocots, ( Lilianae ''sensu'' Chase & Reveal) are grass and grass-like flowering plants (angiosperms), the seeds of which typically contain only one embryonic leaf, or cotyledon. They constitute one of ...

One of the more common species in the genus, '' Merodon equestris'' is known as the Narcissus bulb fly, greater bulb-fly, large bulb fly or large Narcissus fly.

Systematics

Species include: *'' M. aberrans'' Egger, 1860 *'' M. abruzzensis'' van der Goot, 1969 *'' M. adriaticus'' Veselić, Vujić & Radenković, 2017 *'' M. aerarius'' Rondani, 1857 *'' M. analis'' Meigen, 1822 *'' M. aureus'' Meigen, 1822 *'' M. affinis'' Gil Collado, 1930 *'' M. alagoezicus'' Paramonov, 1925 *'' M. albifrons'' Meigen, 1822 *'' M. albifasciatus'' Macquart, 1842 *'' M. albonigrum'' Vujic, Radenkovic & Simic, 1996 *'' M. alexandri'' Popov, 2010 *'' M. alexeji'' Paramonov, 1925 *'' M. ambiguus'' Bradescu, 1986 *'' M. andalusiacus'' Paramonov, 1929 *'' M. andriotes'' Vujić, Radenković & Šašic, 2018 *'' M. annulatus'' (

Fabricius Fabricius ( la, smith, german: Schmied, Schmidt) is a surname. Notable people with the surname include: *people from the Ancient Roman gens Fabricia: **Gaius Fabricius Luscinus, the first of the Fabricii to move to Rome * Johann Goldsmid (1587� ...

, 1794) *'' M. antonioi'' Marcos-García, Vujic & Mengual, 2007 *'' M. armipes'' Rondani, 1843 *'' M. arundanus'' Marcos-García, Vujic & Mengual, 2007 *'' M. atratus'' (Oldenberg, 1919) *'' M. atricapillatus'' Šašić, Ačanski & Vujić, 2018 *'' M. aureus''

, 1805 *'' M. auripes'' Sack, 1913 *'' M. auripilus'' Meigen, 1830 *'' M. avidus'' (Rossi, 1790) *'' M. balkanicus'' Šašić, Ačanski & Vujić, 2016 *'' M. bessarabicus'' Paramonov, 1924 *'' M. biarcuatus'' Curran, 1939 *'' M. bolivari'' Gil Collado, 1930 *'' M. cabanerensis'' Marcos-García, Vujic & Mengual, 2007 *'' M. caerulescens'' Loew, 1869 *'' M. calidus'' Vujić, Ačanski & Šašić, 2020 *'' M. caucasicus'' Portschinsky, 1877 *'' M. chalybeatus'' Sack, 1913 *'' M. chalybeus''

Wiedemann Wiedemann is a German surname. Notable people with the surname include: *Barbara Wiedemann (born 1945), American poet * Christian Rudolph Wilhelm Wiedemann (1770–1840), German physician, historian, naturalist *Elisabeth Wiedemann (1926-2015), Ger ...

in Meigen, 1822 *'' M. cinereus'' (

, 1794) *'' M. clavipes'' (

, 1781) *'' M. clunipes'' Sack, 1913 *'' M. confinium'' Šašić & Vujić, 2020 *'' M. confusus'' Marcos-García, Vujić, Ricarte & Ståhls, 2011 *'' M. constans'' (Rossi, 1794) *'' M. crassifemoris'' Paramonov, 1925 *'' M. crymensis'' Paramonov, 1925 *'' M. crypticus'' Marcos-García, Vujic & Mengual, 2007 *'' M. desuturinus'' Vujic, Simic & Radenkovic, 1995 *'' M. distinctus'' Palma, 1863 *'' M. dobrogensis'' Bradescu, 1982 *'' M. dzhalitae'' Paramonov, 1926 *'' M. elegans'' Hurkmans, 1993 *'' M. equestris'' (

, 1794) *'' M. eques'' (

, 1805) *'' M. erivanicus'' Paramonov, 1925 *'' M. erymanthius'' Vujić, Ačanski and Šašić, 2018 *'' M. escalerai'' Gil Collado, 1929 *'' M. escorialensis'' Strobl, 1909 *'' M. euri'' Vujić & Radenković, 2018 *'' M. femoratoides'' Paramonov, 1925 *'' M. femoratus'' Sack, 1913 *'' M. flavus'' Sack, 1913 *'' M. flavicornis'' Macquart, 1842 *'' M. fractipes'' Paramonov, 1936 *'' M. funestus'' (

, 1794) *'' M. gallicus'' (Vujíc & Radenković, 2012) *'' M. geniculatus'' Strobl, 1909 *'' M. haemorrhoidalis'' Sack, 1913 syn. of M. analis *'' M. hamifer'' Sack, 1913 *'' M. hispanicus'' Sack, 1931 *'' M. hoplitis'' Hurkmans, 2012 *'' M. hurkmansi'' Marcos-García, Vujic & Mengual, 2007 *'' M. kaloceros'' Hurkmans, 1993 *'' M. karadaghensis'' Zimina, 1989 *'' M. kiritschenkoi'' ( Stackelberg, 1960) *'' M. kozufensis'' Radenković & Vujić, 2020 *'' M. legionensis'' Marcos-García, Vujic & Mengual, 2007 *'' M. loewi'' van der Goot, 1964 *'' M. longicornis'' Sack, 1913 *'' M. longispinus'' Marcos-García, Vujic & Mengual, 2007 *'' M. lusitanicus'' Hurkmans, 1993 *'' M. luteihumerus'' Marcos-García, Vujic & Mengual, 2007 *'' M. luteomaculatus'' Vujić, Ačanski and Šašic, 2018 *'' M. manicatus'' Sack, 1938 *'' M. mariae'' Hurkmans, 1993 *'' M. medium'' Vujić, Likov & Radenković, 2020 *'' M. megavidus'' Vujić & Radenković, 2016 *'' M. minutus'' Strobl, 1893 *'' M. nanus'' Sack, 1931 *'' M. natans'' (

, 1794) *'' M. naxius'' Vujić & Šašić, 2018 *'' M. nigritarsis'' Rondani, 1845 *'' M. nisi'' Veselić, Vujić & Radenković, 2017 *'' M. nitens'' Hurkmans & Vujić, 2020 *'' M. olympius'' Vujić & Radenković, 2020 *'' M. orjensis'' Radenković & Vujić, 2020 *'' M. parietum''

in Meigen, 1822 *'' M. peloponnesius'' Vujić, Radenković, Ačanski and Šašic, 2018 *'' M. planiceps'' Loew, 1862 *'' M. pruni'' (Rossi, 1790) *'' M. quercetorum'' Marcos-García, Vujic & Mengual, 2007 *'' M. rojoi'' Vujić & Radenković, 2020 *'' M. rubidiventris'' Costa, 1884 *'' M. ruficornis'' Meigen, 1822 *'' M. rufipes'' Sack, 1913 *'' M. rufus'' Meigen, 1838 *'' M. sacki'' ( Paramonov, 1936) *'' M. segetum'' (

, 1794) *'' M. spicatus'' Becker, 1907 *'' M. spineus'' Vujić, Šašić & Likov, 2020 *'' M. spinitarsis'' Paramonov, 1929 *'' M. splendens'' Hurkmans, 1993 *'' M. strobli'' Bradescu, 1986 *'' M. stukei'' Hauser & Hurkmans, 1997 *'' M. tener'' Sack, 1913 *'' M. teruelensis'' van der Goot, 1966 *'' M. testaceoides'' Hurkmans, 1993 *'' M. toscanus'' Hurkmans, 1993 *'' M. triangulum'' Vujić, Radenković & Hurkmans, 2020 *'' M. tricinctus'' Sack, 1913 *'' M. trochantericus'' Costa, 1884 *'' M. unguicornis'' Strobl, 1909 *'' M. velox'' Loew, 1869 *'' M. virgatus'' Vujić & Radenković, 2016 *'' M. vladimiri'' Vujić, 2018

References

General References for Merodon

*Hurkmans, Willem, 1993. A Monograph of Merodon (Diptera: Syrphidae). ''Tijdschrift voor Entomologie'' 136: 147-234. * Sack, Pius, 1913. ''Die Gattung Merodon Meigen (Lampetia Meigen olim.). Abhandlungen des Senckenbergische Gesellschafts der Naturforscher'' 31: 427-462 {{Taxonbar, from=Q1757479 Hoverfly genera Diptera of Europe Eumerini Taxa named by Johann Wilhelm Meigen