Bee Flies - Family Bombyliidae
This page contains pictures and information about Bee Flies that we found in
the Brisbane area, Queensland, Australia.
- Body length 12mm
Bee Fly adults have long proboscis and feed on nectar and pollen. On a sunny day, they are often seen on feed on flowers, hovering over vegetation or rest on bare ground. They are the the import pollinators, some are even the primary pollinators of some species of flower plants.
Bee Flies are hairy, most of them mimic wasps or bees (Batesian mimics of Hymenoptera). However, they have stout and woolly body and do not have narrowed waist. Their wings are easily recognized with distinctive vein pattern, usually dark in colour, some with patterns or spots. When at rest, their wings are flat in outspread position. Their head is occupied by their large eyes, more or less in hemispherical shape. Their legs are slender and without bristles. Their claws are small.
Bee Flies favour warm, and sunny localities. Most have a strong, hovering flight and are usually found hovering on blossom or patches of bare soil.
- Bee Fly laying eggs in soil
Most of their larvae are parasitic on other insects' eggs or larvae. Very few others are predaceous, free living in soil. As you might imagine, their larvae are hard to be found.
Both flies in Bee Flies family and Hover flies (Syrphidae) family mimic bees. The main character to recognize between them is Bee Flies have longer wings. Hover Flies have shorter wings with a series of closed cell on the wings hind margins.
Subfamily Toxophorinae - Slender Bee Flies
- Bee Flies in the subfamily usually have the slender body covered with
short hairs. They also have long and slender proboscis to feed on
flowers.
Subfamily Bombyliinae - True Bee Flies
- Bee Flies in the subfamily Bombyliinae usually have the stout and hairy body, with long and slender proboscis. The wing vein M1 meets R5 before the wing margin. Sometimes this subfamily is called True Bee Flies because their hairy body resembles bee.
Subfamily Lomatiinae - Long-wings Bee Flies
- In this subfamily, the Bee flies have relatively longer wings and longer body. Their wing vein Rs forks well before r-m, with R4 and R5 strongly looped. They usually have the narrower and flattened abdomen.
Subfamily Anthracinae
- Anthracinae is a very large subfamily. We found quite a number of species in this subfamily and listed in different tribes as below;
Tribe Anthracini - Black Bee Flies
- Bee Flies in this tribe have their wing vein Rs forks very close to cross vein r-m. They are close to the Exoprosopini except they have a pencil of hairs at the tip of antenna. They are from small to medium in size. Most of them are dark brown to black in colour, with patterned wings.
- In this tribe, the Bee flies also have their wing vein Rs forks very close to cross vein r-m. They have stout body comparing with Bee Flies in other groups.
Tribe Exoprosopini - Stout Bee Flies
Tribe Villini - Banded Bee Flies
Other subfamilies
- Reference:
- 1. Insects of Australia, CSIRO, Division of Entomology, Melbourne University Press, 2nd Edition 1991, p 758.
- 2. Insects of Australia and New Zealand - R. J. Tillyard, Angus & Robertson, Ltd, Sydney, 1926, p363.
- 3. Bee Flies (Bombyliidae) - by Giff Beaton, 2005.
- 4. Family BOMBYLIIDAE - Australasian/Oceanian Diptera Catalog - Web Version, by Greg Daniels.
- 5. The cladistics and classification of the Bombyliidae (Diptera: Asiloidea) - by David K.Yeates, 1994.
- 6. An evolutionary radiation of beeflies in semi-arid Australia: systematics of the Exoprosopini (Diptera: Bombyliidae) - Lambkin CL, Yeates DK & Greathead DJ, Invertebrate Systematics, 2003.
- 7. Bombyliidae - Tree of Life, by David K. Yeates and Christine L. Lambkin, 1994.
- 1. Insects of Australia, CSIRO, Division of Entomology, Melbourne University Press, 2nd Edition 1991, p 758.
