Syrphus
Syrphus is a genus of hoverflies. It can be distinguished from other genera of the tribe Syrphini because it is the only genus that has long hairs on the upper surface of the lower lobe of the calypter.

Alvesgaspar · CC BY-SA 3.0 · 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
- SyrphiniPBDB
- Motility
- actively mobilePBDB, for Arthropoda
- Environment
- terrestrialPBDB, for Insecta
Time the record covers
At least 43 million years on record.
The record covers at least 48.07 Mya to 4.7 Mya. No occurrence read is dated outside 56 Mya to 1.4 Mya.
21 occurrences of Syrphus on record, most of them in the Eocene. 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
21 occurrences- Eocene62%
- Oligocene19%
- Miocene14%
- Pliocene3%
- Pleistocene2%
These 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.
Found in
5 formations
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The named rock units Syrphus has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 4 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.
Syrphus and its relatives
EoceneWhere Syrphus and its relatives were recorded in the Eocene.
Found in the same rock
969 taxa- Formicidae4 sites
- Hemiptera4 sites
- Libellulidae4 sites
- Apidae3 sites
- Mycetophilidae3 sites
- Plecia pinguis3 sites
- Acalyptratae2 sites
- Acrididae2 sites
- Berosus (Berosus) morticinus2 sites
- Brachycera2 sites
- Carabidae2 sites
- Cicadellidae2 sites
- Coleoptera2 sites
- Coreidae2 sites
- Culex2 sites
- Curculionidae2 sites
- Deltocephalinae2 sites
- Entiminae2 sites
- Epicypta nigritella2 sites
- Formicinae2 sites
- Hesperinus heeri2 sites
- Hydrobiomorpha fraterna2 sites
- Ichneumonidae2 sites
- Insecta2 sites
The Paleobiology Database records 14 sites for Syrphus, 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
15 references- A revisional study of the fossil Syrphidae3
- A new genus and four new species of fossil Diptera from Montana and Colorado2
- Fossil Diptera from Florissant, Colorado2
- Fossile Dipteren aus der Braunkohle von Rott im Siebengebirge2
- Heer, 18492
- Terrestrial insects of the Rita Blanca lake deposits1
- Neue Dipteren (Brachycera et Cyclorhapha) aus dem Oberoligozän von Rott1
- A new Eocene syrphid from Colorado (Diptera)1
- Fossil insects in the United States National Museum1
- Eocene Insects from the Rocky Mountains1
- New and little known insects from the Miocene of Florissant, Colorado1
- New fossil insects from Florissant, Colorado1
Each of the 21 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. 3 further references are not listed. 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 content2
Picture of Syrphus
- Source
- Wikipedia/Commons
- Credit
- Alvesgaspar
- Licence
- CC BY-SA 3.0
- Commercial use
- the licence allows it
3D model
- Source
- Sketchfab
- Licence
- CC Attribution
- Commercial use
- cannot be read from the licence given — check the record
Smithsonian Open Access was 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, “Syrphus”
- 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 itSyrphini through timeFormations of the EoceneThe world it lived on
Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Fabricius 1775