The Diptera of Lancashire and Cheshire: Craneflies and Winter Gnats by Phil Brighton 32, Wadeson Way, Croft, Warrington WA3 7JS
[email protected] Version 1.1 26 November 2017 1 Summary This document provides a new checklist for the craneflies and winter gnats (Tipuloidea, Ptychopteridae and Trichoceridae) to extend the lists of the diptera of Lancashire and Cheshire first published by Kidd and Bindle in 1959. Overall statistics on recording activity are given by decade and hectad. Checklists are presented for each of the three Watsonian vice-counties 58, 59, and 60 detailing for each species the number of records, year of earliest and most recent record, and the number of hectads with records. A combined checklist showing distribution by the three vice-counties is also included, covering a total of 264 species, amounting to 75% of the current British checklist. Introduction This report is the third in a series to update and extend the partial checklist of the diptera of Lancashire and Cheshire published in 1959 by Leonard Kidd and Alan Brindle1. There were two previous updates, in 19642 and 19713. The previous reports in this series cover the soldierflies and allies4 and the Sepsidae5, the latter family not having been covered in Ref 1. The reader is referred to the first two reports for the background and rationale of these checklists, as well as the history of diptera recording and available data sources. The description of methodology is also kept to a minimum in the present report: only significant differences from the previous publications will be outlined.