Tabanidae
| Tabanidae Temporal range:
| |
|---|---|
| Tabanus sulcifrons[2] | |
| Scientific classification | |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Arthropoda |
| Class: | Insecta |
| Order: | Diptera |
| Superfamily: | Tabanoidea |
| Family: | Latreille, 1802[1] |
| Subfamilies | |
| |
Horse flies and deer flies[a] are true flies in the family Tabanidae in the insect order Diptera. The adults are often large and agile in flight. Only females bite land vertebrates, including humans, to obtain blood. They prefer to fly in sunlight, avoiding dark and shady areas, and are inactive at night. They are found all over the world except for some islands and the polar regions (Hawaii, Greenland, Iceland[3]). Both horse flies and botflies (Oestridae) are sometimes referred to as gadflies.[4] Contrary to popular belief, horse flies can not see infrared light or otherwise detect heat at a distance.[5][6]
Adult horse flies feed on nectar and plant exudates; males have weak mouthparts, but females have mouthparts strong enough to puncture the skin of large animals. This is for the purpose of obtaining enough protein from blood to produce eggs. The mouthparts of females are formed into a stout stabbing organ with two pairs of sharp cutting blades, and a spongelike part used to lap up the blood that flows from the wound. The larvae are predaceous and grow in semiaquatic habitats.
Female horse flies can transfer blood-borne diseases from one animal to another through their feeding habit. In areas where those diseases occur, they have been known to carry equine infectious anaemia virus, some trypanosomes, the filarial worm Loa loa, anthrax among cattle and sheep, and tularemia. They can reduce growth rates in cattle and lower the milk output of cows if suitable shelters are not provided.
Horse flies have appeared in literature ever since Aeschylus in Ancient Greece mentioned them driving people to "madness" through their persistent pursuit.
- ^ International Commission on Zoological Nomenclature (1961). The Bulletin of Zoological Nomenclature. International Trust for Zoological Nomenclature. p. 55.
- ^ Cirrus Digital Horse Fly Tabanus sulcifrons
- ^ Downes, J.A. (1988). "The Post-Glacial Colonization of the North Atlantic Islands". Memoirs of the Entomological Society of Canada. 120 (S144). Cambridge University Press (CUP): 55–92. doi:10.4039/entm120144055-1. ISSN 0071-075X.
- ^ "gadfly". Oxford English Dictionary (Online ed.). Oxford University Press. (Subscription or participating institution membership required.)
- ^ Meglič, Andrej; Ilić, Marko; Pirih, Primož; Škorjanc, Aleš; Wehling, Martin F.; Kreft, Marko; Belušič, Gregor (22 October 2019). "Horsefly object-directed polarotaxis is mediated by a stochastically distributed ommatidial subtype in the ventral retina" (PDF). Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 116 (43): 21843–21853. Bibcode:2019PNAS..11621843M. doi:10.1073/pnas.1910807116. ISSN 0027-8424. PMC 6815168. PMID 31591223. Retrieved 14 June 2025.
- ^ Horváth, Gábor; Pereszlényi, Ádám; Egri, Ádám; Fritz, Benjamin; Guttmann, Markus; Lemmer, Uli; Gomard, Guillaume; Kriska, György (2020). "Horsefly reactions to black surfaces: attractiveness to male and female tabanids versus surface tilt angle and temperature" (PDF). Parasitology Research. 119 (8): 2399–2409. doi:10.1007/s00436-020-06702-7. ISSN 0932-0113. PMC 7366589. PMID 32424552. Retrieved 14 June 2025.
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