''Spilogona sanctipauli'' is a species of

fly Flies are insects of the order Diptera, the name being derived from the Greek δι- ''di-'' "two", and πτερόν ''pteron'' "wing". Insects of this order use only a single pair of wings to fly, the hindwings having evolved into advanced m ...

from 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 ...

first described by

John Russell Malloch John Russell Malloch (16 November 1875 – 1963) was a Scottish entomologist who specialised in Diptera and Hymenoptera. Malloch was born at Milton of Campsie in Stirlingshire, Scotland. His widowed father had one son, James Malloch (born 1873 ...

in 1921. It has a distribution across the high

arctic The Arctic ( or ) is a polar region located at the northernmost part of Earth. The Arctic consists of the Arctic Ocean, adjacent seas, and parts of Canada ( Yukon, Northwest Territories, Nunavut), Danish Realm ( Greenland), Finland, Iceland ...

and is a notable and important pollinator of the

mountain avens ''Dryas octopetala'', the mountain avens, eightpetal mountain-avens, white dryas or white dryad, is an Arctic–alpine flowering plant in the family Rosaceae. It is a small prostrate evergreen subshrub forming large colonies. The specific epithet ...

. The species has been strongly correlated to successful seed setting and may be an integral character in arctic ecosystems.

References

Muscidae Diptera of Europe Insects described in 1921 Taxa named by John Russell Malloch {{Muscidae-stub