CHAPTER XII 



Muscoidea (continued) : The Minor Families of Muscoidea, 

 and The CEstridsB 



The next four families — > Sarcophagidce, Anthomyidce, 

 TachinidcB, and Dexiidce — are here, in accordance with 

 modern custom treated as distinct, but there are good 

 authorities who still regard them merely as subfamilies of 

 Miiscidce. 



Family SarcOPHAGID^ : Flesh-flies (a-dp^= flesh ; (payeiv 

 = to eat). These flies, which have the habits of blow-flies, are 

 distinguished from Muscidce by having the distal half, or less, 

 of the arista bare ; the body also, though thick-set, is more 

 elongate, and in most of the species the thorax is striped 

 black and grey and the abdomen is checkered or mottled 

 black and grey, though some of them have a bluish-black or 

 metallic abdomen. Many of the Sarcophagidce are viviparous, 

 producing numerous small maggots at a birth. 



The larvae live in filth and carrion of all sorts, but some 

 are parasitic in other insects, and the larvae of Sarcophaga are 

 not infrequently found in wounds and in the nasal passages, 

 as well as in the intestine, of man. Cases have been reported, 

 from several parts of the world, in which the frightful havoc 

 wrought by Sarcophaga maggots burrowing from the nasal 

 passages into the tissues of the head indiscriminately, has 

 resulted in a painful and loathsome death, the fcetor being 

 appalling. These larvae much resemble Muscid larvae (Fig. 

 S3) in general form, and more particularly those of the screw- 

 worm {Chrysomyid), the segments being separated by well- 

 marked constrictions, but the spines that encircle the 

 segments are minute. 



Family Anthomyid^ (Fig. 69) (aVOo? = a flower ; /^i;('a = a 



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