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Family Asilidae
- This page contains pictures and information about Zebra Robber Flies that we found
in the Brisbane area, Queensland, Australia.
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 - Body length 15mm
- The Robber Flies have alternating black and white strips on body so we
called them Zebra Robber Flies. On the 1st-5th abdomen segments there are the
white pollinose spots in posterior corners. On the 3rd-5th segments
there are the central white pollinose spot at anterior margin. All legs are
black in colour.
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- The wings are dark brown in colour with small transparent area.
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- Notice the tibia with an apical spur; one of the spines at the apex of the
ventral side of the fore tibia is enlarged. This is the characteristic of the
subfamily Dasypogoninae and Brachyrhopalinae. Those robber fly species
used to be recognised as one group by this large spine on the front tibiae. Based on the phylogenetic hypothesis derived by Dikow (2009) this spine has been independently derived at least once in the Australian
Brachyrhopalinae. This robber fly species is transferred to the newly erected Brachyrhopalinae.
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- This Rubber Fly waits for prey on tree trunk. We found the robber fly
resting on large tree trunk a few time.
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- We saw them a few times in Karawatha Forest during
mid summer.
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- Reference:
- 1. A taxonomic revision of the tribe Chrysopogonini (Diptera: Asilidae) - Clements,
A.N. 1985, Australian Journal of Zoology, Suppl. Ser. No. 109. 93 pp.
- 2. A phylogenetic hypothesis for Asilidae based on a total evidence analysis of morphological and DNA sequence data (Insecta: Diptera:
Brachycera: Asilidae) - Dikow, T. 2009, Organisms, Diversity & Evolution 9: 165–188.
[ Up ] [ Wasp-mimic Robber Fly I ] [ Wasp-mimic Robber Fly II ] [ Zebra Robber Fly I ] [ Zebra Robber Fly II ]
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