Massive bee/fly i.d

[mikey_beeswax]

hello,

I was spooked in the garden today by a huge fly/bee, i rushed to get my camera but it was gone by the time i got back. It was the size of a very large bumble bee (maybe an inch long) but with a much flatter, pale body, it had really large eyes like a fly but with a furry, striped yellow/dark grey abdomen. I dunno whether it was some crazy kind of hoverfly but i didn't think they got that big or were furry? I've never seen anything like it before but i must say my knowledge of invertebrate fauna isn't great.

any suggestions would be appreciated, sorry about the lack of picture

[aeshna5]

Try looking at images of our largest hoverfly, Volucella zonaria, sometimes called a Hornet Hoverfly ( a newly invented name).

[UB4 gardener]

sounds a bit like a hummingbird hawkmoth.

[mikey_beeswax]

Thanks for the quick reply, I don't think it was one of those, it had a much larger abdomen in relation to it's wings and thorax, the shape of a rectangle but with rounded edges.....

[mikey_beeswax]

definitely wasn't a humming-bird hawk moth, no discernible proboscis or anything like that

[mikey_beeswax]

sounds quite similar to this:


Biggest fly I've ever seen



but i haven't found an image that is similar yet

[Gerel]

Have you tried the Tabanus species of horseflies?

Some of them are huge (easily more than an inch in length) and the description sounds possible.

Here's one I found earlier in the summer.



Steve