Overview
Sciadocera rufomaculata
White, of eastern Australia and the New Zealand, lives mainly in cool forests. The larvae apparently live in carrion and can be cultured in the laboratory (Fuller 1934; R. Meier, pers. comm.).
Description
The family is closely related to Phoridae, with which it is occasionally merged, despite its more primitive wing venation. As the typical phorids almost certainly form a monophyletic group without the sciadocerids, the matter of family synonymy is subjective.
Distribution
The genus
Archiphora
includes an extant species of temperate South America as well as Cretaceous-Tertiary fossil taxa of the Northern Hemisphere (Grimaldi & Cumming 1999). There is only one Australian species.