DIPTERA > BRACHYCERA | Higher Diptera

MUSCOMORPHA > SCHIZOPHORA > Acalypratae > Carnoidea > Milichiidae (19 species)

(subfamilies: none)

Small flies found in many habitats, notably stables, fields, woodland, but not coastal; adults regularly visit flowers, carrion and dung; some species are cleptoparasites latching onto and sucking the prey of spiders or predatory insects such as dragonflies.

Family characteristics are given as minute to medium sized (1-6mm), usually dark coloured flies, sometimes lustrous black and/or with an extensive silvery dusting.; mouthparts sometimes elongate; arista bare to pubescent; ocelli present; ocellar bristles present; postvertical bristles parallel or converging, more than one pair of frontal bristles, nearly always with the lower two pairs curving inward, the upper pairs curving forward, outward or backward; interfrontal bristles present, in some cases in distinct rows, but in other cases more scattered; vibrissae or vibrissae-like bristles present, sometimes very thin; wings unmarked; costa with both humeral and costal breaks; vein Sc incomplete; crossvein BM-Cu usually present, in some cases vague or absent; cell cup closed; tibiae without dorsal preapical bristle.