342
THE ESSEX NATURALIST
ambition; a home of his own in the heart of the Essex country-
side.
The traits which had so characteristically endeared him to his
schoolmates and which had earned him such praise in his business
affairs were also apparent to his friends in the Club where he was
throughout held in the highest regard by all the members.
Crane-flies in Thorndon Park, South Essex
By R. M. Payne, F.R.E.S.
In the 80 years that have elapsed since The Essex Naturalist
was first published in 1887, less has appeared in its pages about
the Diptera than about any of the other major orders of insects.
Of course this is not one of the popular orders, and its size and
complexity is such that perhaps no one can be expected to master
it within a lifetime; but it contains a great number of large and
attractively-coloured insects, which should appeal to the collector,
and there are tremendous gaps in our knowledge of the life-history
and habits of many even of the common species, so that there is a
challenge to amateur entomologists to leave the well-trodden paths
of the Lepidoptera and take up the study of a corner of this vast
and only partially explored field.
The crane-flies are not a favourite group even amongst
dipterists, probably because of their fragility and their generally
dowdy appearance. Yet they include several of the very largest
of all British flies, and in practice they are easier to identify
accurately than most other families of Diptera. Although in
general they are soberly coloured, many species have distinctively
marked wings, either with patterns of light and dark spots and
blotches, or attractively tinted yellow or brown. The wing vena-
tion, which can be seen with a very low-powered lens or even with
the naked eye, is one of the principal characters used in dis-
tinguishing genera and species. A good modern key is available
(Coe, 1950) and there is plenty of scope for collecting and studying
the group in Essex, and a strong likelihood that many new county
records are waiting to be made.
Crane-flies are insects whose early stages are spent predomin-
antly in wet soil, humus, rotting wood and fungi. Since they are
not strong fliers they are therefore to be found in greatest abund-
ance and variety in the boggy parts of woods, where all these
elements occur. Large tracts of Essex, which are exposed and
under cultivation, are unsuitable terrain for any but the most
ubiquitous species, but the wooded areas of the county are all
worth careful examination throughout the season—and the larvae