Anthracite bee-fly (Anthrax anthrax)

Here’s a detailed overview of the Anthracite Bee-fly (Anthrax anthrax), a distinctive parasitic bee-fly found in much of Eurasia.

🪰 Anthracite Bee-fly Overview

• Scientific name: Anthrax anthrax
• Common names: Anthracite Bee-fly, Black Bee-fly
• Family: Bombyliidae (bee-flies)
• Size: 8–12 mm in length
• Flight period: Typically May to September, peaking in midsummer.

🌍 Distribution and Habitat

• Range:
  • Widespread across Europe, North Africa, and parts of Asia.
  • Becoming more common in northern areas due to climate warming.
• Habitat:
  • Sunny, warm locations with bare soil or sparse vegetation.
  • Frequently found around solitary bee and wasp nesting sites in sandy or loamy ground.

🐾 Identification Features

• Body:
  • Compact, rounded, and densely covered in black hairs, giving a velvet-like texture.
• Wings:
  • Dark brown/black with a translucent outer margin; when at rest, wings are usually held open in a V-shape.
• Head:
  • Large eyes, short proboscis (unlike some bee-flies with long snouts).
• Legs:
  • Black, relatively short compared to body size.

🍽 Feeding and Behavior

• Adults:
  • Feed on nectar and pollen from various flowers, especially umbellifers (Apiaceae) and composites (Asteraceae).
  • Often hover briefly before landing.
• Larvae:
  • Parasitic: Eggs are laid near the entrances of mason bee (Osmia spp.) and potter wasp nests.
  • First-instar larvae (planidia) crawl into the nest, where they feed on the host’s larva and stored provisions.

🔁 Life Cycle

1. Egg-laying strategy:
   • Females flick or drop eggs into/near the nest holes of bees or wasps, often hovering before making quick approaches.
2. Larval stage:
   • Hypermetamorphic development: first stage is mobile, later stages are sedentary feeders.
3. Pupation:
   • In the host’s nest chamber, emerging the following season.

⚠ Conservation

• Not threatened — often common locally, especially in sandy or loamy soils with abundant solitary bees.
• Plays a regulatory role in wild bee populations but generally does not cause large-scale declines.

🔎 Interesting Facts

• The genus name Anthrax comes from the Greek for coal, referring to the insect’s sooty coloration.
• Their quick “egg flicking” behavior is a distinctive way to spot them in the field.
• While their larvae are lethal to their hosts, adults are important pollinators.

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