Hercostomus
Hercostomus is a genus of flies in the family Dolichopodidae. It is a large genus, containing more than 483 species worldwide. Multiple studies have shown that Hercostomus is a polyphyletic assemblage of species.

Janet Graham · CC BY 2.0 · via Wikipedia/Commons. May be a photograph of a specimen, or an artist’s reconstruction — an interpretation of a skeleton, since colour and soft tissue are almost never preserved.
On record
Recorded, not inferred- Sits inside
- DolichopodinaePBDB
- Motility
- actively mobilePBDB, for Arthropoda
- Environment
- terrestrialPBDB, for Insecta
Time the record covers
At least 4.2 million years on record.
The record covers at least 27.3 Mya to 23.04 Mya. No occurrence read is dated outside 33.9 Mya to 15.98 Mya.
4 occurrences of Hercostomus on record, most of them in the Oligocene. The Paleobiology Database records this as a living group, and the chart stops with its fossils rather than at the present. Bar height is expected occurrences, not a count: each fossil is spread across the span it is dated to, so a tall narrow bar means tight dating and a low wide one means loose.
When
4 occurrencesThese are dates about fossils, not the animal: the record can only begin after it arose and end before it died out, so either end may reach further. Shares are expected occurrences: a fossil dated to a span is counted partly in each period it straddles. More on what this infers.
Hercostomus and its relatives
OligoceneWhere Hercostomus and its relatives were recorded in the Oligocene.
Found in the same rock
111 taxa- Aeolothrips extinctus1 site
- Anomala tumulata1 site
- Anthidium mortuum1 site
- Anthomyia1 site
- Aphaenogaster archaica1 site
- Apis (Synapis) henshawi1 site
- Archaebelyta superba1 site
- Archipraon gausai1 site
- Bibio germari1 site
- Bibio janus1 site
- Bibio mimas1 site
- Boletina1 site
- Boletina philyra1 site
- Brachypeza graciosa1 site
- Bracon rottensis1 site
- Bradysia oligocenica1 site
- Bradysia tertiaria1 site
- Cantharis (Cantharis) carbonaria1 site
- Cossonus robustus1 site
- Cryptus sepultus1 site
- Cyttaromyella bastini1 site
- Cyttaromyia quievreuxi1 site
- Dziedzickia sepulta1 site
- Empis melia1 site
The Paleobiology Database records 3 sites for Hercostomus, and this reads all of them. The number is how many of those sites it was catalogued from too. The 24 sharing the most are listed.
This is not a list of everything alive at the time. It is only what has come out of the same ground as this animal and been written down.
Entered from
3 references- Deux nouveaux dolichopodides fossiles de l'Oligocène inférieur du Haut-Rhin2
- The Dolichopodidae (Diptera) of Mexican amber1
- Quelques nouveaux Diptères des lignites de Rott, Siebengebirge (Allemagne)1
Each of the 4 occurrences read was entered from one of these publications, ordered by how many each accounts for. This is not a search for papers mentioning the name. Entries link to doi.org where the Paleobiology Database holds an identifier, and to its own record where it does not. Relayed as the Paleobiology Database holds them, not checked against what they resolve to.
Media and terms
Media content1
Picture of Hercostomus
- Source
- Wikipedia/Commons
- Credit
- Janet Graham
- Licence
- CC BY 2.0
- Commercial use
- the licence allows it
No 3D scan of Hercostomus was found in Sketchfab.
Smithsonian Open Access and MorphoSource were not reached for this taxon, so this list is what the others held rather than everything there is.
The description on this site
- Source
- Wikipedia, “Hercostomus”
- Licence
- CC BY-SA 4.0
This is what the site found, which is not the same as what exists.
Keep going
What may have been alongside itDolichopodinae through timeFormations of the OligoceneThe world it lived on
Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Loew 1857