154 ANNALS OF SCOTTISH NATURAL HISTORY 



DIPTERA SCOTICA: III. THE FORTH DISTRICT. 

 BY PERCY H. GRIMSHAW, F.E.S. 



IN preparing this, the third of my papers on the Diptera of 

 Scotland, I have thought it advisable to depart somewhat 

 from my original plan, and to take the whole of the Forth 

 area at once rather than deal separately with the small 

 counties which border this important estuary. The list here 

 furnished contains not only the specimens entered in my 

 own register but also all the published records that I have 

 been able to find. It may therefore be taken as a fairly 

 complete summary of all that is as yet known regarding the 

 Diptera of the district, but it is nevertheless strangely 

 incomplete, and many common species which are absolutely 

 certain to occur are not mentioned at all. In my own 

 collection and that of the Edinburgh Museum, as well as in 

 those of my valued friend Mr. Wm. Evans and others whom 

 I know to have collected in the district, there are many 

 thousands of specimens awaiting identification. It may thus 

 be a comparatively simple matter to extend very consider- 

 ably the number of species here recorded, especially when 

 certain hitherto neglected Families, such as Cecidomyidse, 

 Mycetophilidae, Tipulidae, Chironomidae, and Tachinidae, have 

 received their proper share of attention. It is with some 

 reluctance that I venture to publish such a confessedly in- 

 complete list, but with a view to stimulating the interest 

 which I knoio is at last being roused in these insects I 

 have thought it better to issue it for what it is worth 

 rather than delay for an indefinite period. 



The only papers that I have been able to find dealing 

 specially with the Diptera of the Forth district are the 

 following : 



1. 'List of Insects Found in the Neighbourhood of 

 Edinburgh.' By Mr. C. Stewart. " Memoirs of the Wernerian 

 Natural History Society," vol. i. (1811), pp. 566-577. 

 {Diptera on pp. 575-577.] 



2. ' List of Insects Taken by Mr. Hardy in June and July 

 1843, in the Neighbourhood of the Pease Bridge.' By P. J. 



