While a week celebrated in the United Kingdom, we should celebrate the diversity of form and function in the insect world everywhere. Click here for a BBC slide show.

This bizarre Flesh Fly is eating some rotten fruit.  Flies lay eggs on rotting flesh and vegetation.  When those eggs hatch the larvae, known as maggots, feed on what is around them. They are scavengers.  In this way flies play an important part in the environment by helping to break down plant and animal waste.  Did you know that flies are important pollinators?  Just like the bees, flies help spread pollen from plant to plant.  Flies are also an important food source to other animals in the food chain.  From spiders to birds, flies and their maggots provide concentrated protein to those other animals.  In New York state, the Flesh Fly maggot is very important in controlling Tent Caterpillars.

The Flesh Fly does not bite us because it has no biting mouth parts.  They are sometimes called “Friendly Flies” because they will land on us to perhaps get some salt or moisture off of our skin.

Let’s not forget the importance of every animal in the environment.  Flies are scavengers, pollinators, predators and food for other animals.

Flesh Fly, Sarcophaga sp.