A large family of insects including non-biting midges and gnats, characterized by distinctive hand-like antennae in the males.
From Greek 'cheir' (hand) + 'nomos' (law/distribution), with '-idae' being the biological family suffix. Named for the males' elaborate antennae arrangements.
There are over 10,000 species of Chironomidae—in some places their emergences are so massive they show up on weather radar as clouds of insects!
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