Flies

There are 7,786 different species of flies in Australia alone. Mozzies, house flies, bush flies, & blowies all belong to this group and are the ones you are most likely to find in and around your home.

House Flies, Blow flies, bush flies

Life cycle

Within a week of reaching adulthood, a female adult fly lays batches of about 100 eggs in material suitable for larval feeding. Warm, moist, organic materials are preferred. The tapered, maggot-shaped larvae may hatch within a day. Larvae moult about 4 times during feeding, which may last up to a week or even less in more favourable conditions. Once fed, the larvae usually crawl away from the moist food to find a drier location in which to pupate. The pupae remain immobile for up to a week, at which time the adult emerges. The life cycle is usually 2 – 5 weeks but in summer when conditions are favourable up to 12 generations may be produced. Over winter flies will become inactive, hidden & protected, or as larvae that develop very slowly.

Typically alternating between materials that are likely to harbor disease causing organisms (e.g. animal excrement) and human foods, utensils & food preparation surfaces, flies transmit diseases such as typhoid. The abundance of house flies in an area is sometimes used to indicate the efficiency of waste disposal & general sanitary standards of that region.