Another Mystery (Fly) Solved, Maybe

Many may recall how excited Ray became when he first discovered the hairy legged flies covering up the Verbesina and Solidago a fall or two ago. Yes. Those flies were scarily abundant. Well. Maybe they were not super scary because they were also tiny. Tiny may not generally equate to scary.

Since that first discovery we have also found the same flies in the spring, on Ilex, even on Nemophila and the like. But they are not so abundant in the spring. And curiously, they were not so common this fall either. They may have outbursts.

Anyway, we may have discovered the genus of these flies. Maybe even the species if the Bugguide entry is reliable. Perhaps these flies are Empis clausa.