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Culex pipiens/Culex torrentium


I haven't targeted Culicidae for identification up to now and only retained this one because I didn't look at it very carefully in the field and thought it was possibly a cranefly (I assume I didn't notice the proboscis!). I think this keys to Culex pipiens using Mike Hackston's key, though I'd like to see the prealar scales on a Culex torrentium to make sure I'm looking for (and not finding) the right things. Mike's key is based on the 1950 RES Handbook, and according to NatureSpot female pipiens cannot be differentiated from Culex torrentium except by DNA barcoding. As this one is, I think, a female, I am leaving it as either or, though I suspect pipiens is more likely (?). For Hackston's second couplet, the foretarsal claws seemed untoothed from one angle and toothed from another, but I think what looks like a tooth must be what Hackston's key calls "an inconspicuous angle near the base", though at this angle it's certainly more conspicuous than illustrated there. Anyway, the other characters in that couplet go with the untoothed option.

Culex pipiens or Culex torrentium Culex pipiens or Culex torrentium Culex pipiens or Culex torrentium Culex pipiens or Culex torrentium Culex pipiens or Culex torrentium Culex pipiens or Culex torrentium
Chaoborus flavicans showing side of thorax including prealar area, abdomen from above and tarsal claws (2 photos, both of fore tarsi), Wendling Beck Environment Project (Norfolk, UK), 26th July 2024