Long-legged fly on lily
Dolichopodidae
Long-legged fly · Brooklyn Botanic Garden · 13 August 2026
A long-legged fly on a spotted lily petal in the August border, its metallic green catching the light. The family runs to a few thousand species worldwide, most of them tiny predators of even smaller insects on leaf surfaces, and this one belongs to Condylostylus, the genus most often noticed in gardens here.
The metallic green body and the long legs are the marks. They hunt on foot across a leaf, and the whole life of one is spent within a few yards of where it hatched.
Birds, insects, plants and other wildlife, mostly from Brooklyn, with some from further afield.
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