Illustrations of British blood-sucking flies / with notes by Ernest Edward Austen.

  • British Museum (Natural History). Department of Entomology.
Date:
1906
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Illustrations of British blood-sucking flies / with notes by Ernest Edward Austen. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Glasgow Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Glasgow Library.

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    blood-sucking Diptera, may easily be captured or killed. Owing to the size of the Tabanidae, the wound inflicted by the mouth-parts of many of the species is especially severe. Anyone who has seen Tabanus bovinus (Plate 19) attacking horses must have noticed the large drops of blood that exude and trickle from the spots bitten by the flies. Among domestic animals, however, horses and cattle are not the only victims, for in other countries mules, camels, and elephants suffer severely. Wild animals are similarly tormented ; thus in 'The Nile Tributaries of Abyssinia' (London: Macmillan & Co., 1867), p. 210, the late Sir Samuel Baker, writing of the country between the Settite and the Atbara Rivers, mentions herds of game as retreating from the south before the attacks of the Seroot, under which name several species of Tabanus and Pangonia arc known to Europeans on the Blue and White Niles. As regards the attacks of horse-flies upon human beings, abundant though certain species such as those of Hccmatopota occasionally are in the British Islands, we have to turn to continental records in order to understand how serious a pest these flies may become owing to their extraordinary blood- thirstiness. Thus, according to Portschinsky (' Die Bremsen (Tabanidae) und die einfachste Methode dieselben auszurotten.' [In Russian.] Pub- lished by the Ministry of Agriculture and State Domains : St. Peters- burg, 1899, pp. 19.—Summary in German by N. Von Adelung, 'Zoolo- gisches Centralblatt,' VII. Jahrg. (1900), pp. 807-808), in the Gdov District of the St. Petersburg Government, in Russia, horse-flies in summer are so excessively numerous and bloodthirsty that agricultural operations have to be carried out by night; while in parts of Siberia, such as the shores of the River Om, settlers have been compelled entirely to abandon the zone infested by these flies. Noticing that horse-flies frequently seek pools in order to drink, Portschinsky hit upon the expe- dient of covering with a thin layer of petroleum the surface of the water in certain lakes and pools in districts infested by the flies. The result was a brilliant success, and the insects were destroyed in enormous numbers, the majority on attempting to drink adhering to the layer of oil, while others although they managed to fly away, were subsequently choked or poisoned by the petroleum. In this way certain localities, such as the Park of Pawlowsk near St. Petersburg, were completely cleared of these troublesome Diptera. It is interesting C