Subject: Bee Fly?
Location: Las Vegas, NV
August 6, 2014 5:29 pm
I recently encountered this beautiful insect at the Springs Preserve in Las Vegas, NV. I immediately noticed it because of the beautuiful markings on it’s wings and its lovely reddish brown coloration. I tried looking it up in a few books and scoured the internet, but I’ve not found an exact match. Any guesses?
Signature: Renee M. Grayson
Bee Fly
Hi Renee,
We agree that this is a Bee Fly, and we are going to try to identify it more specifically. After a bit of searching, we believe we have correctly identified your Bee Fly as Poecilanthrax effrenus because of the numerous similar images on BugGuide. According to BugGuide: “A southwestern and Mexican species which has the abdominal ground color broadly marked with orange, the black color usually triangular in shape and confined to the dorsum. The hair on the abdomen is predominately black; on the sides there is black hair from segments two to six. The wings are evenly colored with dark brown, the veins at the base of the wing are bright orange. The second submarginal cell is nearly entirely hyaline and the hyaline spot in the discal cell is quite definite.”
Bee Fly: Poecilanthrax effrenus
I like This
I don`t see any black hairs on sides of tergites 2-6. Could this be Poecilanthrax eremicus
Thanks so much for this and all the other fly identifications.