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Chrysotoxum cautum (Harris, 1776)

Identification

Identification difficulty = 2. according to Ball & Morris, 2024¹

Biology

The larva of this species remains unknown, but larvae of this genus appear to be associated with ant-attended root aphids. Adults are usually found in well drained grassy places, often near shelter such as woodland edge or hedgerows where they visit a wide range of flowers. Seen in flight, they have a striking resemblance to a social wasp.

Flight period

The following plots show the number of unique records per week that were not reported to be of eggs, larvae or pupae.

Distribution

This species occurs south and east of a line from the Severn to the Humber (an almost complete reversal of the range of C. arcuatum), except for scattered localities along the coast of Wales and the coast of north-west England. It is locally abundant, especially in southern-central England. This is a species that might be expected to show an expansion of range but as yet there is little evidence of such movement.

Trends

The following plots show the Frescalo TFactor vs year and a map of the rescaled frequency (all records) for the species. For an explanation see here.