Martin Harvey's blog

Last weekend the annual Dipterists Forum workshop took place at Preston Montford Field Studies Centre, and focused on two groups of flies: the Anthomyiidae and the Soldierflies and allies.

NEW to download from

The recording scheme Newsletter no. 5 (spring 2018) is now available to read online and download.

This issue includes:

We had a fantastic response to Bee-fly Watch last year, with over 1,300 records - see the 2017 summary page.

This is the annual workshop meeting for Dipterists Forum at Preston Montford FSC, Shropshire. This year soldierflies and allies are one of the groups being covered.

A fantastic new book on robberflies has been published: Field guide to the robberflies of the Netherlands and Belgium, by Reinoud van der Broeck and André Schulten. An English-language version is available, and the guide covers all the British species with excellent photos and illustrations at a very reasonable price.

Today is World Robberfly Day. an event with a long and distinguished history, dating all the way back to a bright idea from Erica McAlister in 2015.

A mid-season summary of the data on the two spring-active bee-flies can be downloaded here.

Yesterday we launched Bee-fly Watch for 2017, and today the first two bee-flies for the year were reported! One from the Isle of Wight and one from Dorset. Where will be next?