B. micans Hutton

B: micans Hutton, ib., p. 6.

♀. Eyes broadly dichoptic, with delicate and indistinct scattered hairs; front shiny black with a patch of silvery pubescence above the antennae; this patch is dull black in certain lights and notched on posterior margin. Antennae situated below middle line, somewhat short and stout; 1st and 2nd joints bristly, the former black and about as long as the latter, which is brownish and square in shape; flagellum black with a dense and stiff pubescence obscuring the segmentation — however, the ultimate segment is not quite twice as long as the penultimate, both of which have distinct terminal hairs (fig. 18). Face shiny black with a greyish tomentum and a few black delicate hairs, while scattered over the surface are several circular black spots. Proboscis pale tawny; palpi testaceous or tawny, 2-jointed, the 1st hairy and the 2nd minutely pubescent with an indistinct terminal bristle. Occiput flat but not depressed.

Dorsum of thorax rounded, of a brilliant greenish-blue with darker bronzy reflections, the humeri testaceous; scutellum coloured as dorsum but narrowly margined with tawny, the spines large and tawny; halteres pale tawny.

Legs tawny, the posterior femora and tibiae with darker reflections; the tarsi (except protarsi and proximal part of epitarsi) fuscous; all the protarsi longer than the epitarsi but not half as long as the whole joint.

Wings yellow or faintly tinged with yellow, stigma light yellow and veins yellow; 3rd vein almost straight, the anterior branch arising at right angles and but slightly curved to the costa, 1st section of 3rd vein not as long as anterior cross-vein, which is perpendicular; vein between the basal cells obsolete and represented by a limpid line; basal cells closed posteriorly by an oblique cross-vein (fig. 19).

Abdomen brownish-black and shiny, beyond the middle broader than the thorax.

The ♂ differs from the ♀ only in length, and perhaps in the colour of the thorax, which is of a more brilliant bluish-green. Hutton's type is a male, the antennae of which are lost.

♂. Length, 4 mm.; wing, 3–75 mm.

♀. Length, 5 mm.; wing, 4–5 mm.

Habitat.—♂, Colac Bay, December (Howes); Auckland (Broun) ♀, West Plains, Otago, October (Philpett).