 The males of many species exhibit elaborate secondary sexual characters assumed to aid in species recognition during courtship.These characters include flaglike flattening of the arista and tarsi, strongly modified setae and projections of the tarsi, the prolongation and deformation of podomeres, orientated silvery pruinosity, and maculation or modification of the wings.Dolichopodids are well represented in amber deposits throughout the world and the group has clearly been well distributed since the Cretaceous at the latest.