Taxonomy
Platycheirus peltatus
Distribution
Species Biology
Preferred environment
Wetland; fen and humid, unimproved grassland, along rivers and streams in grassland and heathland and in association with tall herb vegetation of flushes in grassland; in the Alps also in open areas in humid Fagus/Abies forest. Humid, tall herb vegetation along rivers and streams and in seasonally-flooded grassland is the principal habitat for P.peltatus in Ireland. It also occurs in fen. General land surface drainage, that accompanies intensification of farming, results in loss of habitat for this species and it is not found in improved or intensive grassland. Neither does it occur in conifer plantations (other than in humid, open areas not planted with trees, or plantations newly-established in erstwhile humid grassland, where the young trees have not yet grown to produce closed-canopy conditions) or suburban gardens, horticultural establishments or orchards. So in today's Ireland it has to be classed as a largely anthropophobic insect.
Adult habitat & habits
Among dense waterside and fen vegetation; males hover within 1m of the ground in spots of less dense vegetation; settles on foliage.
Flight period
May/August, with a peak in June/July and occasional specimens on into September. Larva: available descriptions are unreliable, due to doubt about identity of the species involved. The larva is supposedly illustrated in colour by Rotheray (1994).
Flowers visited
White umbellifers; Allium ursinum, Berteroa incana, Epilobium, Eupatorium, Euphorbia, Galium, Papaver, Ranunculus.
Irish reference specimens
In the collections of NMI and UM
Determination
Haarto and Kerppola (2007a), Bartsch et al (2009a). The species is illustrated in colour by Torp (1994) and Bartsch et al (2009a). Van Steenis and Goeldlin (1998) provide a key separating the female from females of other European peltatus-group species (see also under P. nielseni Vockeroth).
Distribution
World distribution(GBIF)
Uncertain, due to confusion with other species until recently, but presence confirmed in Iceland, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Ireland, Britain, Germany, the Netherlands, the Ardennes and Vosges mountains, the R. Loire floodplain, the Rhine valley, the Pyrenees and the Alps (Switzerland, Liechtenstein, Austria), the former Yugoslavia; Altai mountains (SE Siberia); Japan. According to Vockeroth (1990), records of this species from N America are erroneous. This species is not regarded as threatened, and is frequent in Scandinavia. It occurs further south to central France and through the mountains of central/southern Europe to the Balkans. Its range in Asiatic parts of the Palaearctic is unclear and likely to remain so until more recent revisions of relevant regional faunas have been carried out.
Irish distribution
Recorded as occurring in Ireland in Coe (1953), but at that time this species was confused with other Platycheirus species. The presence of P. peltatus in Ireland was confirmed by Speight and Vockeroth (1988). In Ireland until recently this insect seemed to be decreasing in frequency quite rapidly. Its apparent requirement for tall ground vegetation is not compatible with increased grazing intensities, which exacerbate the problems caused by drainage of humid grassland, by leaving a turf too short for P. peltatus in humid grassland where the species might otherwise still occur. However, there are recent records from field margins and young conifer plantations in parts of the island from which records were previously lacking.
Temporal change
Records submitted to Data Centre in 2025
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References
Publications
Speight, M. C. D. (2008) Database of Irish Syrphidae
(Diptera). Irish Wildlife Manuals, No. 36. National Parks and Wildlife Service.
Department of Environment, Heritage and Local Government, Dublin, Ireland.
Speight, M.C.D. (2014) Species accounts of European
Syrphidae (Diptera), 2014. Syrph the Net, the database of European Syrphidae,
vol. 78, 321 pp., Syrph the Net publications, Dublin.