Comprehensive inventory of true flies (Diptera) at a tropical site.

Estimations of tropical insect diversity generally suffer from lack of known groups or faunas against which extrapolations can be made, and have seriously underestimated the diversity of some taxa. Here we report the intensive inventory of a four-hectare tropical cloud forest in Costa Rica for one year, which yielded 4332 species of Diptera, providing the first verifiable basis for diversity of a major group of insects at a single site in the tropics. In total 73 families were present, all of which were studied to the species level, providing potentially complete coverage of all families of the order likely to be present at the site.

Remarkable fly (Diptera) diversity in a patch of Costa Rican cloud forest: Why inventory is a vital science.

Study of all flies (Diptera) collected for one year from a four-hectare (150 x 266 meter) patch of cloud forest at 1,600 meters above sea level at Zurquí de Moravia, San José Province, Costa Rica (hereafter referred to as Zurquí), revealed an astounding 4,332 species. This amounts to more than half the number of named species of flies for all of Central America. Specimens were collected with two Malaise traps running continuously and with a wide array of supplementary collecting methods for three days of each month.

A revision of the shore-fly genus Hendel (Diptera, Ephydridae).

The species of the genus Hendel are revised, including 13 new species (type locality in parenthesis): (United States. New Mexico. Grant: Silver City (Big Ditch; 32°46.

Two new, brachypterous Limnellia species from the Venezuelan Andes (Diptera: Ephydridae).

Two new, brachypterous species of Limnellia are described from specimens collected in the Venezuelan Andes: L. vounitis (Trujillo: Bocon, La Cristalina (Andes; 09°14.7'N, 70°19.

A review of Mimapsilopa Cresson (Diptera: Ephydridae) from Brazil.

Species of Mimapsilopa from Brazil are reviewed with an emphasis on the fauna from southern Brazil, where six new species were discovered and herein are diagnosed and described. To facilitate identification of species, we have included a diagnosis of the tribe Discomyzini and of Mimapsilopa and have also provided an annotated key to the New World genera of the tribe. We have also provided photos of representative specimens, illustrations of structures of the male terminalia and a distribution map for all included species.