Family Xiphydriidae

Page last updated 10th Feb 2021

Xiphydria camelus, Sculthorpe 2019 (Andy Bloomfield)


Genus Xiphydria

Xiphydria camelus
Sawfly website; Steven Falk photos

Not often recorded, with a scatter of records from 1954 to 1997. More recently from Sculthorpe in 2019, and from Winterton and Upton Fen in 2020. Larvae are found in the wood of alder or birch.


Xiphydria longicollis
Sawfly website; Steven Falk photos

This species was first noted in  Britain in 1984 and remains an apparently rare (or very overlooked) insect. It has, however, been recorded three times in Norfolk so far, from Wymondham College in 2010 and again in 2019, and from Fairhaven Water Gardens in 2016. All records have been in August. Larval associations so far appear to be both oak and field maple in the UK.


Xiphydria prolongata
Sawfly website; Steven Falk photos

Previously considered very rare in the county (Durrant 2000), with a single 20th century record, near Stalham on 2nd Aug 1937. However, more recent records from Hoe Rough (2006), Welney (2015), Shotesham (2015), Holme (2016) and Acle (2020) all in the period 11th June to 23rd July. Larvae feed inside the wood of willows.

4 comments:

  1. AndyG26 January 2019 at 12:08

    For reference, we recorded X. longicollis as the seventh UK record in Morley (google images "Xiphydria longicollis natureplus" and the finger that one is sitting on is mine! The link itself is now dead). Id was confirmed by the national recorder at the time in Liverpool. I'll try to find the exact date and location for your records - Tracy will know!
    Andy Gardiner

    ReplyDelete
  2. Andy Musgrove26 January 2019 at 12:10

    Brilliant, thanks Andy. Get me the details and I'll update the text above. This is all a work in progress.

    ReplyDelete
  3. AndyG28 January 2019 at 10:28

    Andy, more information.
    It was 19/08/2010. Appx location TM079988. Wymondham College. Id confirmed by Guy Knight from photos. At least 5 individuals present; crawling through vegetation. The email exchange confirming the id is available if required. Tony Irwin was notified but the record location may have been kept off NBIS as a sensitive site at the time. I believe it was the 7th UK record, would have been the 5th but, a short time before our record, two individuals had emerged from a firewood pile in someone's home elsewhere in the country! :-)
    Hope that helps.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Andy Musgrove28 January 2019 at 12:08

    Thanks Andy, that's great. I'll add to the database. It wasn't in the NBIS data I received.

    ReplyDelete

Subscribe to: Posts (Atom)