Cheilosia ( Cheilosia ) abagoensis Skufjin, 1979

Bot, Sander, Mengual, Ximo, Meutter, Frank Van de & Skevington, Jeffrey H., 2025, Review of the genus Cheilosia Meigen, 1822 (Diptera: Syrphidae) from the Caucasus, with the description of 14 new species, European Journal of Taxonomy 1023, pp. 1-181 : 4-5

Cheilosia ( Cheilosia) abagoensis Skufjin, 1979

Fig. 1

Cheilosia abagoensis Skufjin, 1979: 194 .

Cheilosia abagoensis – Peck 1988: 95. — Barkalov 1993: 721. — Barkalov & Mutin 2018: 482. — Mengual et al. 2020: 14.

Differential diagnosis

It can be confused with several other species of Cheilosia that have the combination of a pilose eye, bare face, shiny sterna, black legs and posterior margin of scutellum with setae (e.g., C. caucasi sp. nov., C. gemmula sp. nov., C. rhynchops ). Nevertheless, it can be relatively easy identified by the shiny posterior anepisternum, at least slightly pruinose in the others, and the blackish infuscate wings ( Fig. 1A, C), hyaline or almost so in the other mentioned species.

Material examined

Collected in 2018, 2019 and 2021; see Mengual et al. (2020) for detailed records from 2018.

Genetics

DNA barcodes of C. abagoensis cluster all together with high support (BS = 99.6%), including three specimens of C. caucasi sp. nov.

Biology

During our expeditions, collected between June 15 th and 13 July between 1900 and 2295 m a.s.l. All specimens were collected on alpine meadows.

Distribution

Caucasus ( Russia, Georgia).