HEGAl'OPINAF. 



ROBBER FLIES OF THE WORLD 



427 



tucked in beneath the seventh segment. Female ter- 

 minalia consists of a rather long, conical process, at- 

 tenuate posteriorly, swollen and widened at the base 

 and directed upward. The ninth and tenth elements 

 are borne at the end, have considerable fine, radiating 

 pile and are of the same width as the apical part of 

 the eighth segment. Terminal segment creased and 

 partly divided medially. 



Distribution : Neotropical : Dory elm carreral Brom- 

 ley (1951); crassitarsis Macquart (1846); distendens 

 Wiedemann (1828) [ = cyaneiventris Macquart (1846), 

 guentherii Lynch Arribalzaga (1882), latipes Wulp 

 (1870), varipennis Walker (1855)] ; mexicanus Brom- 

 ley 1951) ; panamensis Curran (1942) ; plaumanni 

 Bromley (1951). 



Genus Pseudoryclus Carrera 



Figure 427 



Pseudoryclus Carrera, Arq. Zool. Sao Paulo, vol. 8, p. 75, 1952. 

 Type of genus: Megapoda riifirentris Roeder, 1887, by 

 orginal designation. 



Polished and shining flies, mostly black, of bare 

 aspect and greatly reduced pile. From Doryclus Kon- 

 dani, which they resemble, they are distinguished by 

 the comparatively simple hind tibia and tarsus, which 

 are not only less swollen distally but do not bear the 

 dense brush of coarse pile. The abdomen is larger. 

 Like Doryclus they are flies of marked drooping aspect 

 and slow flight, alighting among low herbage. Length 

 15 to 20 mm. 



Head, lateral aspect : The head of moderate length, 

 the face in profile forming a low triangle, gently con- 

 cave beneath the antenna. The occiput is scarcely 

 visible in profile either above or below and only slightly 

 in evidence in the middle of the head ; its pile is bristly 

 in character and scanty. There is a row of submar- 

 ginal, slender, proclinate bristles beginning below the 

 middle of the head. The proboscis like its relatives is 

 extremely long, laterally compressed, plane or slightly 

 concave below, gently arched to a distal point above, 

 with a strong carina along the subbasal portion. The 

 single segmented palpus which does have a trace of 

 the basal segment is extremely long, conspicuous, gently 

 sigmoid, cylindrical, and densely beset with bristles. 

 It is more than half as long as the proboscis. The an- 

 tenna is attached at the upper third of the head, the 

 first two segments are short, the first segment strongly 

 swollen and bears long, slender bristles ventrally, later- 

 ally, and dorsally near the apex. Second segment with 

 shorter bristles below but still longer ones above, 2 or 

 3 of which are conspicuous. Third segment narrow at 

 the base, strongly dilated on the outer third with short, 

 truncate, spine-tipped microsegment. 



Head, anterior aspect: The head is wide, but not 

 wider than the thorax; the upper face is nearly one- 

 third the head width, slightly divergent below, its 

 height greatly reduced in the middle on account of the 

 very large, triangular, concave, oblique, subepistomal 

 area. Sides of face with a triangle of pubescence, the 



remainder polished. Front broadly raised over the 

 middle, shining and bare, wrinkled, with numerous, 

 bristly hairs laterally. Vertex moderately excavated, 

 the ocellarium comparatively narrow, extended behind 

 the ocelli where it bears a dense tuft of anteriorly 

 curved bristles. Anterior eye facets a little enlarged, 

 flattened, and the whole eye waxy. 



Thorax : The thorax is long, comparatively low, the 

 anterior margin abrupt and vertical, the pronotum 

 sunken, the humerus with 3 small humps. The mesono- 

 tum is considerably more narrow than the thorax and 

 bears a somewhat pinched or compressed aspect. It is 

 partly pollinose, the pile scattered, fine and bristly with 

 a differentiated row of acrostical elements but with DO 

 dorsocentral elements present except poorly in front 

 of the scutellum. Humerus with bristly pile and per- 

 haps weak bristles. The lateral complement of stout 

 bristles consists of 1 notopleural, 1 supraalar, 1 post alar, 

 and no scutellar bristles. Scutellar disc with scat- 

 tered, bristly hairs, otherwise bare. Pleuron vitreus, 

 the pronotal collar with numerous, slender bristles and 

 bristly pile, likewise the cervical sclerites and the lateral 

 pronotum. Lateral propleuron bare anteriorly, with 4 

 setae posteriorly. Whole of the mesopleuron, upper 

 sternopleuron, pteropleuron, and anterior hypopleuron 

 with scattered, fine, erect, bristly hairs. Similar but 

 more abundant pile on the metapleuron. Posterior hy- 

 popleuron with a rather conspicuous, large patch of 

 suberect, dense pile. Lateral and ventral metasternuni 

 pilose; the former sends a thin tongue of chitin inward 

 behind the posterior coxa. Postmetacoxal area with a 

 linear tongue of chitin extending inward from the lat- 

 eral part. Presternum small and fully dissociated. 



Legs : The legs are polished and almost without pile ; 

 all the legs lengthened, the hind pair more so. Bristles 

 everywhere stout and rather numerous on the femora 

 and on all of the tibia. These bristles are short, except 

 the more distal elements along the ventral surfaces of 

 the tibia where they are long and conspicuous. The 

 hind femur bears 6 or 7 lateral, 1 dorsolateral at the 

 outer seventh, 10 or 11 ventral bristles, some of them 

 doubled, and 1 medial bristle at the apex. Hind tibia 

 nearly twice as wide at apex as at base. There is a 

 ranked brush of setae confined to the distal half of the 

 medial surface. It bears 7 dorsal bristles, the basal 

 element double, 3 lateral, 3 long and 3 short posteroven- 

 tral bristles. Middle femur with 5 posterior, 10 an- 

 terior, and 7 or 8 ventral bristles. Middle tibia with 8 

 anterior, 5 dorsal, 6 posterior, and 4 ventral bristles, the 

 apical circlet excluded. Anterior femur with 4 or 5 

 minute, dorsal bristles or setae and a like number of 

 posterodorsal bristles; both of these groups are confined 

 to the outer half. They have a partly double row of 

 6 or 7 bristles ventrally. Anterior tibia with 1 long, 

 stout bristle anteriorly near the apex, 1 ventrally not 

 quite so close and still farther back 1 posteroventral 

 bristle. There is an anterodorsal, a posterodorsal, 

 a posterior and posteroventral row of short bristles, 

 each containing about 7 elements. The apex of this 

 tibia has a long, stout, setate process and stout spine. 



