File: <corydal.htm> [For educational purposes only] Glossary <Principal Natural Enemy Groups> <Citations> <Home>

NEUROPTERA, Corydalidae -- <Images> & <Juveniles>

Please refer to the following link for details on this group: Link 2

The family Corydalidae contains megalopterous insects known as dobsonflies and fishflies. There are about 12 species that occur mainly throughout the Northern Hemisphere, both temperate and tropical, and South America.

They are large Megaloptera, with a body usually larger than 25 mm (1 inch). They may have long filamentous antennae, though in male fishflies they are characteristically feathered. Ocelli are present; the fourth tarsal segment is cylinder-shaped. The four large wings are translucent, smoky grey, or mixed, and the anterior pair is slightly longer than the posterior one.

The eastern dobsonfly, is the most well-known North American species among the dobsonflies. These genera have distinctive elongated mandibles in males and form the subfamily Corydalinae. The genera in which the males have normal mandibles, called fishflies, form the subfamily Chauliodinae. The summer fishfly, Chauliodes pectinicornis, is perhaps the best-known of these in North America; its immense mating swarms in the Upper Mississippi River region fill the air on a few summer nights each year much like mayflies in certain regions of Europe, leaving millions of carcasses to be cleaned up the next day.

Larvae are aquatic, active, armed with strong sharp mandibles, and breathe by means of abdominal branchial filaments. When full sized , which requires several years, they depart the water and spend a quiescent pupal stage on the land, in chambers dug under stones or logs, before metamorphosis into the sexually mature insect.

= = = = = = = = = = = = = = =

References: Please refer to <biology.ref.htm>, [Additional references may be found at: MELVYL Library]

Brigham, W.U., A. K. Brigham, and A. Gnilke. 1982. Aquatic Insects and Oligochaetes of North and South Carolina. Midwest Aquatic Entomologist.

Haaramo, Mikko. 2008. Mikko's Phylogeny Archive: Corydalidae. Version of 2008-MAR-11.

McCafferty, W. P. 1983. Aquatic Entomology: The Fishermen's Guide and Ecologists' Illustrated Guide to Insects and Their Relatives. Jones and Bartlett Publishers.

Merritt R.W., & K.W. Cummins. 1996. An Introduction to the Aquatic Insects of North America (Third Edition). Kendall/Hunt Publishing Company.

Peckarsky, B. 1990. Freshwater Macroinvertebrates of Northeastern North America. Comstock Publishing.

Schwiebert, E. G. 1955. Matching the Hatch. Macmillan Publishing Company.

Stehr, F. W. 1998. Immature Insects. Kendall/Hunt Publishing Company.

Usinger, R. L. 1956. Aquatic Insects California, with keys to North American Genera and California species. University of California Press.