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Meligramma euchromum (Kowarz, 1885)

Identification

Identification difficulty = 3. magnifier_icon camera_filled_icon according to Ball & Morris, 20241

Synonymy

Syrphus euchromus Kowarz in Coe(1953)2, Epistrophe euchroma (Kowarz) in Stubbs & Falk (1983)3.

Biology

The larvae of this genus are predaceous upon arboreal and scrub-dwelling aphids, and perhaps also on tall herbs. The precise predator prey relationship has yet to be established, however. Adults fly in May and June and can often be found on sun-lit leaves of Sycamore Acer pseudoplatanus and Horse Chestnut Aesculus hippocastaneum. The adults have been recorded visiting the flowers of Blackthorn Prunus spinosa, Hawthorn Crataegus sp. and Wood Spurge Euphorbia amygdaloides. There is a record of a specimen bred out from a larva found in a suburban garden in south London.

Flight period

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

Status

Lower Risk (Nationally scarce) - Ball & Morris, 20144. Rare (RDB3) - Falk, 19915 and Shirt, 19876.

Distribution

This is a largely southern species that occurs as far north as South Cumbria, South Yorkshire, Derbyshire and Anglesey. There are post-1990 records from Dorset, North and South Hampshire, South Wiltshire, West Gloucestershire, Surrey, East Kent, Middlesex, Derbyshire and West Lancashire. dotmap

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. trend

  1. Ball, S., & Morris, R. (2024). Hoverflies of Britain and Ireland. WILDGuides (3rd ed.). Oxford: Princeton University Press. ↩

  2. Coe, R. (1953). Diptera: Syrphidae. Handbooks for the Identification of British Insects, 10(1), 1–98. ↩

  3. Stubbs, A., & Falk, S. (1983). British Hoverflies: An Illustrated Identification Guide (1st ed.). Reading: BENHS. ↩

  4. Ball, S., & Morris, R. (2014). A review of the scarce and threatened flies of Great Britain. Part 6: Syrphidae. ( No. 9). Species status (pp. 1–130). Peterborough: JNCC. ↩

  5. Falk, S. (1991). A review of the scarce and threatened flies of Great Britain. ( No. 39). Research and Survey in Nature Conservation (pp. 1–194). Peterborough: NCC. ↩

  6. Shirt, D. (Ed.). (1987). Red Data Books: 2. Insects. Peterborough: NCC. ↩