Dipterist specialists visit Dorset
Of the four major orders of insects, i.e. Coleoptera, Hymenoptera, Diptera and
Lepidoptera, in Dorset at least, diptera (flies) are the most poorly recorded. So when a group comprising 31 entomologists with a passion for flies descended on Kingston Maurward for a week in the early summer of 1998, to spend the annual Dipterist Forum meeting recording Diptera in the Dorset countryside, great things were expected.
The following is a brief resume of the report of this meeting, received from Dipterist Forum.
The conditions were changeable, i.e. typical English weather. However
on most days there were long periods of sunshine allowing plenty of
recording to be accomplished. Each day the group split into smaller
parties travelling to one or more of the 101 sites visited during the
week. The sites comprised a wide range of habitats including salt marsh,
wet and dry heathland, coastal areas and chalk downland.
These visits generated 9120 records for 1676 species of terrestrial invertebrates including 1209 species of fly and 253 species of hymenoptera. In total 231 species of threatened and Nationally scarce species were recorded including 154 flies and 41 hymenoptera, in addition two flies were recorded as new to
Britain.
It is interesting to note that as well as diptera and hymenoptera there were also 90 species of beetle, 22 species of true bug, 46 species of moth, 18 species of dragonfly and 11 species of grasshopper recorded.
All the above mentioned records will eventually be stored on the RECORDER programme operated by
DERC.
NB. In the last Newsletter, mention was made of the number of species of Tephritidae fly found in Dorset. The above report has added another 5 species to our list which means that Dorset is now 5th in the county rankings.
John Hunnisett
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Dorset Environmental Records Centre
