Melangyna species have eye bare, with short sparse hairs, or with abundant distinct hairs; face always at least slightly broadened below, tubercle always well developed, face at most slightly prominent below, rarely entirely yellow, usually with distinct and often broad black medial vitta, sometimes darkened laterally and yellow-brown ground colour scarcely visible; scutum black, shining or sub shining, sometimes slightly or densely pollinose laterally, never yellowish laterally; scutellum dull yellow toblackish brown, but never metallic; pleura black, shining or pollinose, at most with obscure yellowish area on posterodorsal part of anepisternum; katepisternal pile patches usually broadly or moderately broadly separated, rarely narrowly joined posteriorly; metacoxa with tuft at posteroventral apical angle; terga 2 to 4 with transverse yellow maculae which are always well separated, usually sub rectangular, occasionally broadened laterally but never oblique; maculae of tergum 2 usually narrower than those of tergum 3, rarely much larger and subquadrate; very rarely maculae of tergum 2, or all pale abdominal markings, completely absent; sterna with black fasciae or entirely darkened (from Vockeroth 1969).
Adapted from Vockeroth (1992).
FEMALE.
Head: Face at least slightly widened below, pale yellow with pale pile, densely pale yellow pollinose, with narrow black medial vitta; ventral facial margin yellow or narrowly black; gena black. Frons black, with rather large arcuate pale gray or brown pollinose fascia at mid length. Eye bare or nearly so, scattered hairs if present separated from one another by much more than own length.
Thorax: Scutum black, shining or subshining; notopleuron and dorsal two-thirds of pleura densely whitish gray pruinose. Scutum and pleura with white pile. Scutellum yellow, very narrowly black laterally; scutellar pile mostly black. Ventral scutellar fringe complete. Pleura black, shining to densely gray pollinose, yellowish on dorsal half in some specimens. Dorsal and ventral katepisternal pile patches separated or narrowly joined posteriorly. Anterior anepisternum, meron, katatergum, and metasternum bare. Wing moderately bare: cell c usually bare on about basal one-sixth, rarely bare only at extreme base or on about basal half; cell bm usually about three-quarters bare, rarely with only some microtrichia near apex. Legs: Metacoxa with posteroventral apical pile tuft. Pro- and mesofemora dark brown to black on about basal one-third; rest of femora and tibiae yellow-orange; tarsi brownish; metaleg mostly dark brown to black.
Abdomen nearly parallel sided, unmargined. Terga 2-4 with transverse yellow maculae always well-separated; tergum 2 tergite with two large, subquadrate, little wider than greatest length, nearly reaching anterior margin of tergum over entire width and lateral margin over entire length maculae; yellow maculae of terga 3 and 4 extending to lateral margins in their full length. Sterna pale yellow; sternum 1 with central black macula; sternum 2 with narrow black fascia, sterna 3-5 usually each with broad black fascia extending forward laterally to anterior margin; black areas shining or very weakly pollinose, considerably reduced in some specimens.
Melangyna (Melangyna) fisherii (Walton, 1911).
Walton, W.R. (1911) Notes on Pennsylvania Diptera, with two new species of Syrphidae. Entomological News 22, 318-322, 1 pl. [1911.06.30]
Synonyms:
Syrphus fisherii Walton, 1911: 319.
Stenosyrphus diversipunctatus Curran, 1925: 106.
Fagisyrphus, Meligramma and Dasysyrphus have always placed close to Syrphus, sometimes as the sister groups. Meligramma was reduced to a subgenus of Melangyna by Vockeroth (1969) and World Catalogues followed him, but larval characters did not support a sister group relationship between them, a result also suggested by Mengual et al (2008). Thus, molecules and larval evidence support results of Dusek and Laska (1967) in giving Meligramma full generic status. Rotheray and Gilbert (1999) resolved Melangyna as sister group of Syrphus. In Mengual et al. (2008) Melangyna was resolved alone, separately from Meligramma and Fagisyrphus as using larval evidence (Rotheray and Gilbert 1989, 1999).
unless otherwise stated