Volume 48, Number 1,
May 2002:
Scorpionflies, Hangingflies, and other Mecoptera

Text-only version

ISSUE HOME PAGE

ABOUT THIS ISSUE
- about KSN
- about the author

IN THIS ISSUE
- The Order Mecoptera
- Fossils
- Modern Species
- Family Panorpidae
- Family Bittacidae
- Family Meropeidae
- Family Panorpodidae
- Family Boreidae
- Key to the Families of North American Mecoptera (Adults)
- References

SLIDESHOW
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Scorpionflies, Hangingflies, and other Mecoptera
by Geroge W. Byers

Figure 6. An adult male Boreus on snow.

FAMILY BOREIDAE

These small (length 2–5 mm), darkly colored mecopterans are most often and most easily seen on snow. They are boreal, the adult stage being attained in winter or at high elevations in mountains, or at high latitudes, such as in Alaska. As far as is known, the diet of both larvae and adults consists of leafy parts of bryophytes (mosses and liverworts). The mating behavior of Boreus, our only common genus, differs from that of other Mecoptera. The male grasps the female with his slender, hardened wings and moves her to a position above his back, with the lower part of her elongate ovipositor inserted into his ninth (genital) segment (Figure 7). Larval boreids, like those of Brachypanorpa, lack abdominal prolegs and conspicuous dorsal setae; they do, however, have lateral eyes, usually each with three ommatidia (visual units). Some systematists have placed Boreidae in a separate order from Mecoptera.

Figure 7. A mating pair of Boreus snow scorpionflies.