CHAPTER 11. 



Family PSYCHODID.E. 



Subfamily PHLEBOTOMTN.E. 



Plate I., fig. 4. 



The little, densely hairy, moth-like* flies belonging to the 

 subfamily Psychodince (genera Pericoma and Psychoda and their 

 immediate alhes), which constitute the major portion of this family, 

 are so far as is at present known perfectly harmless, although it 

 has recently been stated! that it is probable that an Indian species 

 sucks blood at least occasionally. These flies, which are to be met 

 mth ruiuiing about on leaves in damp and shady places, or on the 

 windows and walls of outbuildings, have stout, thick-set bodies, 

 rather broad wings, and legs of ordinary length ; the body, margin 

 of the wings, wing-veins, and legs are densely clothed or fringed 

 with hair, and the wings when at rest slope hke a roof over the 

 abdomen. The few blood-sucking species of Psychodidae, which, 

 though hkewise hairy, are distinguished from these harmless forms 

 by certain important differences in structure and appearance, 

 belong to the subfamily Phlebotomince, and, with perhaps an 

 occasional exception, J to the genus Phlebotomus, the species of which 

 are known to Enghshmen as " Sand-flies." 



* Sharp (Cambridge Natural History, — Insects, Part II., p. 470 (1899)) calls the 

 Psychodidse "Moth-flies," and Leonard Haseman, in his "Monograph of tlie Xorth 

 American Psychodidae " {Transactions of the American Entomolorjical Society, Vol. 

 XXXIII. (1907), p. 299) writes: — ^" The Psychodidae have been very appropriately 

 called ' moth-flies,' from the resemblance which they bear to tiny moths." — The 

 designation " Owl Midges," has recently been proposed for this family by Mr. 

 Theobald. 



f By F. M. Hewlett, of the Agricultural Research Institute, Pusa, Bengal, in a 

 paper on " Indian Sand-Flies," read before the Medical Congress held in Bombay 

 in February, 1909. 



J As stated in the author's pamphlet, " Blood-sucking Flies," &c.. Third Edition, 

 p. 6, note (London: British Museum (Natural History), 1907), the Rev. A. E. 

 Eaton has in England observed blood in the abdomen of Sycorax silacea, Hal., 

 a Palaoarctic species of Phlebotominae, " and has made a similar observation in 

 Algeria in the case of an undescribod species of the same genus." 



