This big fuzzy guy slammed into the wall next to me...

[BepopCola]

I was walking to class and this big guy slammed into the wall next to me.
I thought it was a big ol' black carpenterbee (I'm after one) so I put it in my bug collecting bottle and took it home.
I was getting ready to pin it and noticed its exoskeleton had no give, it was pretty cracked. Maybe thats why it crashed or a result of the crash.

I believe it's an aptly named beezlebub-bee-killer robber fly.
I just wanted to share!

 

[The Snark]

TWO OBJECTIONS, YOUR HONOR! First, the term 'Bee Killer' is sensationalism and members of the scientific community who use that term should be caught, shot, and unceremoniously buried in the mud under hog pens. Their more appropriate colloquial name is 'Robber fly' and their primary prey is the entire spectrum of hymenoptera. Second there are two 'Bee Killers', both in the family Asilidae, one in the genus Laphria and two (or more) others in the genus Mallophora, L. Asackeni and M. Leschenaulti and Fautrix respectively.

If anyone would care to expound on these zorps I'd much appreciate it.

P.S. No offense meant to the OP. I overheard supposed experts expounding and confounding those two genera long ago and have never got it straight in my mind since.

 

[TreeTops1015]

Dont those things give you a painful bite,I'm no expert in flies but it looks like those that give you that bite

 

[BepopCola]

TWO OBJECTIONS, YOUR HONOR! First, the term 'Bee Killer' is sensationalism and members of the scientific community who use that term should be caught, shot, and unceremoniously buried in the mud under hog pens. Their more appropriate colloquial name is 'Robber fly' and their primary prey is the entire spectrum of hymenoptera. Second there are two 'Bee Killers', both in the family Asilidae, one in the genus Laphria and two (or more) others in the genus Mallophora, L. Asackeni and M. Leschenaulti and Fautrix respectively.

If anyone would care to expound on these zorps I'd much appreciate it.

P.S. No offense meant to the OP. I overheard supposed experts expounding and confounding those two genera long ago and have never got it straight in my mind since.

I didn't even know these two genera existed until today.

Dont those things give you a painful bite,I'm no expert in flies but it looks like those that give you that bite

They do bite! Though I've never been bitten by one of these types. It's usually the more slender variety.

 

[The Snark]

Dont those things give you a painful bite,I'm no expert in flies but it looks like those that give you that bite

They do bite! Though I've never been bitten by one of these types. It's usually the more slender variety.

With at least 5,000 makes and models to choose from, and many of them being blood hunters, some will bite humans. And then you have 'horse flies', the Tabanidae family which are in all intents and purposes gigantic industrial grade mosquitoes with an agenda. They carry diseases and their bite is mean enough to spook a horse.

 

[Salmonsaladsandwich]

TWO OBJECTIONS, YOUR HONOR! First, the term 'Bee Killer' is sensationalism and members of the scientific community who use that term should be caught, shot, and unceremoniously buried in the mud under hog pens. Their more appropriate colloquial name is 'Robber fly' and their primary prey is the entire spectrum of hymenoptera. Second there are two 'Bee Killers', both in the family Asilidae, one in the genus Laphria and two (or more) others in the genus Mallophora, L. Asackeni and M. Leschenaulti and Fautrix respectively.

If anyone would care to expound on these zorps I'd much appreciate it.

P.S. No offense meant to the OP. I overheard supposed experts expounding and confounding those two genera long ago and have never got it straight in my mind since.

Mallophora actually do appear to be specialist hunters of bees and wasps. Sure, they eat other insects too, but it's been found that honeybees alone can make up 80% of the diet of M. orcina and there's even been cases of beekeepers suffering noticeable losses from hundreds of them attacking their hives.

http://entnemdept.ufl.edu/creatures/misc/flies/bee_killers.htm

Perhaps the name "bee killer" is less appropriate for Laphria species (several of which resemble bumblebees and have been called bee killers, not just one) as they are generalists (and appear to have special adaptations for hunting beetles- here's some neat info about them: http://swb.usachoice.net/laphriini/laphria/laphria.htm), but they still prey on bees with some regularity and L. thoracica is known to skulk around apiaries to hunt honeybees.

I think "bee killer" is an appropriate and interesting common name that conveys a lot of information about bee- mimic robber flies. It tells you that the "fake bee" isn't just a fly that mimics bees to trick predators, but a voracious predator that can prey on the stinging insects it mimics.

 

[The Snark]

@Salmonsaladsandwich Thanks. Informative. All sorts of insect hunting 'flies'. What initially caused me such confusion is multiple orders, families and clades are involved in both hunter and hunted.
My objection still stands however. 'Killer'. Sensationalism, pure and simple, and the scientific community should be ashamed of catering to the anthropo tendency to do this. Using that logic, cats should be called mouse killers along with wolves, hawks are bunny killers, eagles are lamb killers. Enough with the dumbing down popularism connotations.Why not use an inclusive more accurate term, 'hunter'?
Unless of course one theory of evolution may be accurate: Homo erectus > Homosapien > Homostultus.
(I'll stop just shy of calling homosapiens sub North American Homoerectus bovinophagus. Maybe.)

 

[Villagecreep]

I was walking to class and this big guy slammed into the wall next to me.
I thought it was a big ol' black carpenterbee (I'm after one) so I put it in my bug collecting bottle and took it home.
I was getting ready to pin it and noticed its exoskeleton had no give, it was pretty cracked. Maybe thats why it crashed or a result of the crash.

I believe it's an aptly named beezlebub-bee-killer robber fly.
I just wanted to share!

View attachment 319686 View attachment 319687 View attachment 319688

Hey! im not the only one who brings bug collecting containers to school!