A worldwide community photographing and learning about wildlife
Project Noah Nature School
Trichophthalma punctata
Body 12mm. abdomen flattened, pointy, vaguely banded black and yellow; some white setae below thorax, large red eyes touching at the centre, heavily venated wings, huge proboscis...
Suburban back yard.
That pointy fly returned yesterday and this time I caught it feeding on the flowers of willow myrtle (Agonis flexuosa). I thought the flowers were well finished weeks ago. One of the Nemestrinidae (tangle veined, long tongued flies)? ... thanks to lori.tas for direction. http://bie.ala.org.au/species/NEMESTRINI...
Spotted on Feb 2, 2013
Submitted on Feb 3, 2013
15 Comments
Great spotting Argy Bee!
they're highly untrainable Sergio
A wasp with a vacuum cleaner? What comes next, a howsekeeper party?
Thanks Antonio, Lauren and lori - Nemestrinidae is a whole new thing to look at - it looks good for this one ...
Really neat fly, Argy! I've never seen one of these before!
I think it's a species of Tangle-veined fly, aka Long-tongued fly (Nemestrinidae sp.). Possibly this one: http://www.brisbaneinsects.com/brisbane_...
Great capture Argy,amazing,congrats and thanks for sharing
Well thanks everyone for the comments. I didn't think much about the proboscis but now that you mention it, it IS a big one !! (might be a Hoover or a Dyson?)
That is some proboscis!
After quickly scanning the previous comments, I have to say that I had the exact same reaction about this fly. What a crazy snout! Great capture!
This looks like thew same one http://www.projectnoah.org/spottings/171...
great fly... unweildy probiscus though... love the thing it's feeding on, wonderful shape.
proboscis ? -more like a metal detector ! -great spotting argybee !!
Nice series, Argy Bee.
What a proboscis!