Small spotty-eyed drone fly
The small spotty-eyed drone fly is a little hoverfly with very special eyes: they are covered in black spots, like a leopard. From a distance it can look like a small bee. It hovers around ponds, ditches and wet meadows, often close to farm animals.
How fast is it?
Fun facts
Its eyes are spotted with black and hairy all over, in both males and females.
Its body is black with a green shine, and its back has five grey stripes.
It is happy near people and farms, even beside muddy ditches and manure pits.
It flies from the middle of April to September, and even longer in southern Europe.
Each wing is only about 6.5 to 8 millimetres long.
Most asked questions about Small spotty-eyed drone fly
?Is the small spotty-eyed drone fly a bee?
No, it is a hoverfly. It may look a little like a bee, but it cannot sting.
?Where does the small spotty-eyed drone fly live?
All over Europe and across Asia as far as Japan, China and India, near ponds, rivers and wet places.
For bug experts
- Scientific name
- Eristalinus sepulchralis
- Group
- Flies and mosquitoes
- Family
- Syrphidae
- Classification
- Insecta > Diptera > Syrphidae
- Lives on
- Europe, Asia
Where the facts come from
- Eristalinus sepulchralis (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 unknown author. CC BY-SA 3.0, Wikimedia Commons. The sticker of this bug is drawn from this picture.
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