Anastoechus nitidulus (Fabricius, 1794)

Arabyat, Sahar, Katbeh-Bader, Ahmad & Greathead, David, 2004, The bee flies (Diptera: Bombyliidae) of Jordan, Zootaxa 654, pp. 1-48 : 13-14

Anastoechus nitidulus (Fabricius, 1794)

Material: 41 specimens: Al Muwaqqar 7.X.2002 (6ɗ, 13Ψ); Ar Rummanah 28.IX.2002 (2ɗ, 2Ψ); Dana 23.III.1995 (1ɗ, 1Ψ); Rum 30.III.2000 (1Ψ), Um Ishrin 31.III.2000 (2ɗ), 1.IV.2000 (2ɗ, 1Ψ); Wadi An Nawatif 27.IX.2002 (1ɗ, 3Ψ); Wadi shuqayq 24.IX.2002 (3ɗ, 1Ψ); No data (2ɗ).

Distribution: Palaearctic: Afghanistan, Austria, Belgium, Bosnia­Herzegovina, Bulgaria, China, Croatia, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iran, Italy, Japan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyz Republic, Macedonia, Mongolia, Portugal, Romania, Russia, Slovenia, Spain, Slovakia, Turkey.

It appears to be common in dry regions of Jordan. It was collected from Lactuca orientalis Boiss (Compositae) and Polygonum equisetiforme Sibth (Polygonaceae) . The larvae of this species were reared from Locusta migratoria (Linnaeus) and other species of Acrididae (du Merle, 1975).