''Mesembrina mystacea'' is a fly belonging to the family

Muscidae Muscidae are a family of flies found in the superfamily Muscoidea. Muscidae, some of which are commonly known as house flies or stable flies due to their synanthropy, are worldwide in distribution and contain almost 4,000 described species in ...

Distribution

This species is present in the

Palaearctic realm 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-Sibe ...

, from

Fennoscandia __NOTOC__ Fennoscandia ( Finnish, Swedish and no, Fennoskandia, nocat=1; russian: Фенноскандия, Fennoskandiya) or the Fennoscandian Peninsula is the geographical peninsula in Europe, which includes the Scandinavian and Kola penins ...

south to

Turkey Turkey ( tr, Türkiye ), officially the Republic of Türkiye ( tr, Türkiye Cumhuriyeti, links=no ), is a list of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country located mainly on the Anatolia, Anatolian Peninsula in Western Asia, with ...

and from the Atlantic seaboard across

Eurasia Eurasia (, ) is the largest continental area on Earth, comprising all of Europe and Asia. Primarily in the Northern and Eastern Hemispheres, it spans from the British Isles and the Iberian Peninsula in the west to the Japanese archipelag ...

to as far as

Mongolia Mongolia; Mongolian script: , , ; lit. "Mongol Nation" or "State of Mongolia" () is a landlocked country in East Asia, bordered by Russia to the north and China to the south. It covers an area of , with a population of just 3.3 millio ...

Description

''Mesembrina mystacea'' can reach a length of . These large, distinctive flies are beautifully colored in black, yellow-brown and white. They have a stout body. The long body hairs are mostly black, but they show a band of fine yellow-brown short hairs anteriorly across the thoracic dorsum and dense brown hairs on the abdomen, with white hairs at the edge. Metathorax and abdomen are shiny black. Eyes are bare. A large orange colouration is present on the base of the wings. The species exhibits a certain sexual dimorphism. In fact the anterior yellow-brown thoracic band of hairs is much narrower in the male than in the female. Moreover in the male the mid tibiae are curved with longer hairs, while in the females they are straight and without longe hairs. These flies closely mimic certain ''

Bombus A bumblebee (or bumble bee, bumble-bee, or humble-bee) is any of over 250 species in the genus ''Bombus'', part of Apidae, one of the bee families. This genus is the only extant group in the tribe Bombini, though a few extinct related gene ...

'' species (bumblebees) (

Apidae Apidae is the largest family within the superfamily Apoidea, containing at least 5700 species of bees. The family includes some of the most commonly seen bees, including bumblebees and honey bees, but also includes stingless bees (also used ...

family). They are very similar to the hoverflies '' Criorhina berberina'' and '' Pocota personata'' ( Syrphidae). Superficially they also resemble the hoverfly '' Volucella bombylans''. M. mystacea is the only bumble-bee mimic among the

Mesembrina ''Mesembrina'' is a genus from the fly family Muscidae. Species These 16 species belong to the genus ''Mesembrina'': * '' Mesembrina asternopleuris'' Fan, 1992 * '' Mesembrina aurocaudata'' Emden, 1965 * '' Mesembrina ciliimaculata'' Fan & Zh ...

species present in western Europe. Speight, Martin C. D., and Robert Nash. “Chrysotoxum Cautum, Ctenophora Ornata, C. Pectinicornis, Helophilus Trivittatus and Mesembrina Mystacea (Diptera), Insects New to Ireland.” The Irish Naturalists’ Journal 24, no. 6 (1993): 231–36. http://www.jstor.org/stable/25539813.

Biology and habitat

Adults of ''Mesembrina mystacea'' can be found from June to September. The larvae feed on dung and dead material. In western Europe these flies are forest insects. They can be found in woodland or be grazed by cattle, in the

Quercus An oak is a tree or shrub in the genus ''Quercus'' (; Latin "oak tree") of the beech family, Fagaceae. There are approximately 500 extant species of oaks. The common name "oak" also appears in the names of species in related genera, notably ' ...

, Fagus and

Picea A spruce is a tree of the genus ''Picea'' (), a genus of about 35 species of coniferous evergreen trees in the family Pinaceae, found in the northern temperate and boreal (taiga) regions of the Earth. ''Picea'' is the sole genus in the subfam ...

zones. This species belongs to insects with complete metamorphosis which involves a pupal stage. Encyclopedia of Life

External links

arthropodafotos.de

Insecta.pro

Ukrainian Biodiversity Information Network

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q11989122 category:Muscidae Palearctic insects