Martin Harvey's blog

As I write this, no-one has yet reported a bee-fly sighting in 2018! In 2017 the first one was on 2 March, so it's a late spring as far as the bee-flies are concerned.

But they will be here soon I'm sure, and as soon as you do start seeing them please report them to our Bee-fly Watch project. To find out how to take part go to:

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 our distribution maps page: a draft atlas of al

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.

The first thing to say is a big "thank you" to everyone who is sending in records - this year has almost equalled 2016 already and we're not half-way through the season yet!