Kite-tailed robberfly
Tolmerus atricapillus
The kite-tailed robberfly is a small grey and black fly. It belongs to the robber flies, a family of fast hunters that grab other insects. It is hard to tell apart from its close cousins.
Lives in
Europe and Asia
Length
1.1 to 1.4 cm (0.43 to 0.55 in)
Can it hurt you?
Can bite
It is not dangerous. Like other robber flies it could nip if you hold it, so just watch it.
What does it eat?
Like other robber flies, it catches other small insects to eat.
How big is it?
How long is it?
🍚as long as 2.5 grains of rice in a row⚽could fly across a whole football pitch in 34 seconds⚡moves 220 times its own body length every second
How big is Kite-tailed robberfly compared to YOU?
Just maths in your browser. Nothing is saved or sent anywhere.
How fast is it?
A person walking about 5 km/h (3.1 mph)
Kite-tailed robberfly about 11 km/h (6.8 mph)
A kid running fast about 13 km/h (8.1 mph)
A grown-up on a bike about 25 km/h (16 mph)
cool stuff
Fun facts
1
It belongs to the robber flies, a big family of hunting flies.
2
Even experts need special books with keys and drawings to tell it apart from very similar flies.
3
Its body is only about one to one and a half centimetres long.
you asked
Most asked questions about Kite-tailed robberfly
?How big is the kite-tailed robberfly?
It is about 11 to 14 millimetres long, a bit longer than a fingernail.
?Is the kite-tailed robberfly dangerous?
No. It hunts small insects, not people.
For bug experts
- Scientific name
- Tolmerus atricapillus
- Group
- Flies and mosquitoes
- Family
- Asilidae
- Classification
- Insecta > Diptera > Asilidae
- Lives on
- Europe, Asia
Where the facts come from
- Machimus atricapillus (Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0): what it looks like, where it lives, what it eats, sizes and fun facts, retold in simple words.
- Picture by Janet Graham. CC BY 2.0, Wikimedia Commons. The sticker of this bug is drawn from this picture.
If we got something wrong, sorry, we are bug fans, not a science journal. Tell us at [email protected] and we will fix it.
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