Black-tailed aphideater
Eupeodes luniger
The black-tailed aphideater is a common hover fly with yellow and black stripes, a bit like a wasp. It has hook shaped yellow marks along its belly. Its babies are hungry hunters of aphids.
Lives in
Europe, North Africa, Siberia, Japan and North India, in meadows, gardens and woodland clearings
Can it hurt you?
Harmless
Harmless. Hover flies cannot bite or sting, even though they look a bit like wasps.
What does it eat?
The grown-ups visit flowers like dandelions, buttercups and blackthorn. The babies eat aphids.
How fast is it?
A person walking about 5 km/h (3.1 mph)
A kid running fast about 13 km/h (8.1 mph)
Black-tailed aphideater about 14 km/h (8.7 mph)
A grown-up on a bike about 25 km/h (16 mph)
cool stuff
Fun facts
1
It is a great traveller and migrates long distances.
2
It flies from April to November.
3
It lives from the lowlands up to 2,000 metres high in the Alps.
4
Each wing is about 8 millimetres long.
you asked
Most asked questions about Black-tailed aphideater
?Can the black-tailed aphideater sting?
No. It is a hover fly, so it has no stinger.
?Why is it called an aphideater?
Because its babies eat aphids, which helps gardeners.
For bug experts
- Scientific name
- Eupeodes luniger
- Group
- Flies and mosquitoes
- Family
- Syrphidae
- Classification
- Insecta > Diptera > Syrphidae
- Lives on
- Europe, Africa, Asia
Where the facts come from
- Eupeodes luniger (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 Sandy Rae. CC BY 3.0, 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.
Bug Wiki honey jar For grown-ups: Bug Wiki is free, with no ads and no tracking. A small tip helps keep it online.Leave a tip
Housefly
New World screwworm fly
Lovebug
Tsetse fly
Common fruit fly
Asian tiger mosquito
Cotton seed bug
Chinese bushbrown
Formosan swift
Common pug
Great banded grayling
Beet webworm moth.jpg){kind=link}