A worldwide community photographing and learning about wildlife
Project Noah Nature School
Allograpta neotropica
A small Flower Fly of 7 mm in length. It has an abdominal pattern that I can't find on the internet as well as a hairy bicolored scutellum. It is probably a species of Allograpta. Family Syrphidae. See notes below.
Garden lights, semi-rural residential area, San Cristobal de Las Casas, Chiapas, Mexico, 2,200 meters.
Dr. Christian Thompson, a Syrphid specialist at the Smithsonian in Washington has confirmed that this is Allograpta neotropica. Southern Mexico is probably its northernmost range. Sergio Monteiro found this fly in Brazil in 2015: (http://www.projectnoah.org/spottings/112...) and Juand.duenas also spotted this fly in Colombia in 2012: (http://www.projectnoah.org/spottings/131...). Allograpta neotropica appears on a list of 11 Syrphids reported from the Brazilian Amazon (http://syrphidae.inpa.gov.br/syrphidae/i...) and there is an unidentified picture of A. neotropica from the island of St. Martin in the Lesser Antilles (Caribbean). This species was described in 1936 by Curran. It is surprising how rarely it is encountered.
Spotted on Oct 11, 2018
Submitted on Oct 13, 2018
4 Comments
You're welcome Sergio. Yes, it is amazing how many species we have in common. Chiapas is more like Guatemala than the rest of Mexico and is often the northern-most limit for the south and central american species.
Thank you for the tip on the ID of my fly. It is amazing how many species can be found both in Mexico and southern Brazil, even if these places are almost 10,000 Km away from each other!
Thank you Luis. I sent the pictures to the Smithsonian and Dr. Christian Thompson has just confirmed that this is Allograpta neotropica. See the notes above.
Good find Lauren.