House Flies
Latin Name
Musca domestica
Appearance
What do house flies look like?
picture of house fly
Size: 4 to 7.5 mm long
Color: Usually gray
Body: Four black stripes on the thorax. House flies are covered with small hairs that serve as taste organs.
Eyes: Their compound eyes are extremely complex: thousands of individual lenses allow them a wide field of vision.
Sand flies
Scientific Name
Family Psychodidae; Subfamily Phlebotominae
Appearance
What Do They Look Like?
Sand Fly Illustration
Sand fly adults are small flies – only about 3 mm long – and are golden, brownish or gray colored. They have long, piercing mouthparts that are well adapted for sucking blood from their selected host. Sand flies hold their hairy-looking wings in a vertical V-shape when at rest, a characteristic that distinguishes them from some other small flies.
Flesh flies
Facts, Identification, & Control
Scientific Name; Family Sarcophagidae
Appearance
What Do They Look Like?
Characteristics: Flesh flies look like house flies, but are generally larger.
Color: They are gray with a checkerboard pattern on the top of their abdomen. Three black stripes run along the top surface of their thorax, and sometimes a reddish-brown tip at the end of the abdomen.
Sewage flies
Facts, Identification & Control
Latin Name; Psychodidae
Appearance
What Do They Look Like?
Appendages: These flies have six legs and a pair of wings and antennae.
Body: Light gray or tan body and lighter-colored wings. The body and the wings are covered with long hairs, giving the fly a fuzzy appearance.
Characteristics: When at rest, the drain fly folds its wings over the body in a characteristic roof-like manner.
Size: Sewage flies measure about 1.5 to 5 mm long.
Larvae: Sewage fly larvae are not longer than 4 to 10 mm when fully mature and they are slender with a dark strip on the “back” or dorsal area. Larvae do not have eyes, and they are legless. On one end of the larva, there is a dark breathing tube used to extend out of the film to obtain air.