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Hi, everybody!

This is a Hoverfly that I think is an Eristalis. The dark area in the wing atracted my attention, as I had never seen one like this before. I wonder if it can be Eristalis horticola...

The picture was taken on June the 1st in the outskirts of Oviedo, Asturias, N Spain, by a track with plenty of flowery plants.

Any suggestion or comment will be very appreciated. Many thanks in advance.

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I'm attaching another view, just in case it's useful. It shows the hairy aristas and the colours of the legs, not the pattern I'm used to see in other Eristalis I find in my area.

Thank you for looking and saying what you think!

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Might be a male of E. lineata, as the hind margins of the tergites seem to be orange-yellow. There are only few species with dark bands on the wings.

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Thanks a million for the input, Sundew!!!

Maybe my information is wrong, but I was told E. horticola and E.lineata were the same thing, two names for the same species... :|

On the other hand, and as far as I know, in Spain we have not many Eristalis species, and all are widespread species found in C Europe, so they shouldn't be so difficult to tell appart with decent detailed pictures, I hope.

The only ones we have with a wing shade are horticola (or lineata???) and rupium but the wing shade in the later seems to be remarkably more intense than in my Eristalis. So I concluded it was horticola (or lineata???).

I took the name "Eristalis horticola" from the "British Hoverflies" by Stubbs and Falk. If horticola and lineata are really the same species, is "Eristalis lineata" the better name accepted?

Sorry, I'm new to Syrphidae, I only started to pay them attention seriously this season and my knowledge is still very limited. But this group fasciates me and I'm learning loads trying to ID by myself all the species that I find. The main problem is I'm not sure of my conclusions, but I hope to "solve the trouble" in this site, looks like a terrific place to talk about this marvelous group of flies! :)

Thank you again

Marián

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Dit is de correcte naam: E. horticola (De Geer, 1776), conserved by designation of neotypes ICZN 2006-06-30. Musca lineata van Harris [1776] is een synoniem.

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Next time in English please, Jan ;)

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Sorry, I'm late here... too busy taking pictures of flies to come here to check. ;)

All is clear now, thanks a million.

Plenty of stuff to post with questions and very little time to prepare the pictures. ;) Oh well, the winter is long...

Regards

Marián

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Next time, one post please, Andre. :p

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Just corrected the error Jorge .. B)