636 ASILIDiE 



1. PHILONICUS 



Philonicus Loew, Linn. Ent., iv., 144 (1849). 



Rather large light grey flies, notable from their comparative 

 absence of pubescence and by the female having a circlet of 

 spines at the end of the ovipositor. 



Head with but little pubescence on the frons or ocellar tubercle ; facial knob and 

 face-beard rather small, leaving' the upper half of the face bare ; festoon rather 

 inconspicuous though represented by distinct stiff bristles which do not (or scarcely) 

 curve over at their tips. Antennee normal ; style about as long as the third joint, 

 and with its basal joint short and inconspicuous. 



Thorax with the usual stripes well defined, and with only very short bristly 

 pubescence on all the front part. Bristles normally two praesutural, two supra-alar, 

 two postalar, and with the dorso-central rows dying down towards the hindmargin 

 and also dying out anteriorly about half-way between the suture and the front ; 

 metapleural and hypopleural fans distinct but with not very strong bristles. 

 Scutellum normally with only two marginal bristles. 



_ Abdomen with but little long pubescence, but vsdth long distinct prsehind marginal 

 bristles towards the sides ; eighth ventral segment of the male quite simple and not 

 very short. Genitalia of the male rather long but not at all clubbed, the forceps 

 being rather narrow and enclosing a wide space as the claspers are deeply cut back 

 after about half their length ; ovipositor long, conical at its extreme base but 

 strongly compressed laterally for the rest of its length, and with a terminal circlet of 

 stumpy but obvious spines (fig. 351). 



Legs rather slender, and all black though somewhat obscured by closely adherent 

 short pale pubescence; the longer pubescence scarce, and the bristles practically 

 normal (including the terminal tibial circlets) but few in number ; middle femora 

 with only one anterior bristle near the middle ; tarsal joints all normal in length. 



Wings normal. Alar squamae with a rather dense marginal fringe. 



This genus may be distinguished in the female sex from all other 

 British Asilince by the anal circlet of spines, and from Proda- 

 canthus and its allied genera by the absence of any recurrent veinlet or 

 even kink in the upper branch of the cubital fork and by the lower branch 

 of that fork ending after the wing-tip. The distinctive generic characters 

 of the male are not so easily defined ; our British genera, Asilus, Pam- 

 ponerus, and Bhadiurgus have no prsehindmarginal bristles on the sides of 

 the abdominal segments, and moreover bear no resemblance to the light 

 grey Philonicus ; Dysmachus has long bristly pubescence right up to the 

 front part of the thorax ; Machimus and our species of Eutolmus have the 

 hindmargin of the eighth ventral segment produced into a lobe or pair 

 of prongs; Neoitamus and Epitriptus have conspicuous yellow markings 

 on the legs. 



Philonicus was originally founded upon the common and widely 

 distributed P. albiceps, of which the Mediterranean P. elutus may be only 

 a variety. P. dorsiger Wied. and P. scaurus Walk, appear to have the 

 legs colored as in Tolmerus, while P. areolaris Bigot from Celebes is 

 probably a Pamponerus, but van der Wulp described two species from 

 South Asia (Celebes and Sumatra) which he considered to belong to this 

 genus. 



1. P. albiceps Meigen. Light yellowish grey, with the usual darker 

 markings. Legs black. Scutellum with two pale marginal bristles. 

 Ovipositor with a circlet of short spines. (Fig. 345.) 



