Megaselia scalaris (Loew)

Disney, R. H. L., Prescher, S. & Ashmole, N. P., 2010, Scuttle flies (Diptera: Phoridae) of the Canary Islands, Journal of Natural History 44 (3 - 4), pp. 107-218 : 179-185

Megaselia scalaris (Loew)

( Figures 59–62 )

Phora scalaris Loew, 1866 .

Aphiochaeta xanthina Speiser, 1908 .

Aphiochaeta fissa Becker, 1908 .

Aphiochaeta conjuncta Becker, 1908 .

Aphiochaeta banksi Brues, 1909a .

Aphiochaeta circumsetosa Meijere, 1911 .

Aphiochaeta ferruginea Brunetti, 1912 .

Aphiochaeta repicta Schmitz, 1915 .

Obelosia plusiivorax Enderlein, 1919 .

Megaselia forticapilla Beyer, 1959 .

Linked to its catholicity of larval feeding habits, this species has become the ultimate tramp species (e.g. Nickolls and Disney 2001), but it is primarily a warm climate species that typically only extends to higher latitudes by being restricted to indoor situations (e.g. Zwart et al. 2005).

Previous records

La Palma, Tenerife.

New records

Four males, one female, La Palma, Parc National de la Caldera de Taburiente, Lugar, Playa de Taburiente, 20 September 1999 ( T. Domingo-Quero, MNCMN); several of both sexes, Tenerife , Adeje y Las Galletas , November 2004 (Ángeles Padilla Cubas ). A sample of puparia, pupae and freshly emerged adults featured in a bizarre forensic case in Tenerife. These were collected in February 2000 from the soiled shroud in a vandalized coffin of a baby found exposed in a hollow. The baby’s corpse had been buried in March 1998. The vandals had exhumed the coffin and stolen the remains of the corpse. The indications were that the scuttle flies had been attracted to the soiled shroud after the exhumation of the coffin (Disney and Ana Maria Garcia-Rojo, unpublished data) .

Natural history

The larvae breed in a wider range of decaying organic materials than any other insect, occasionally they are facultative parasitoids of invertebrates, probably when they are already debilitated, and are also facultative parasites (myiasis agents) of vertebrates, including man. The large literature on this species has recently been reviewed ( Disney 2008a).

Figures

Figure 59. Megaselia scalaris male. (Drawing by J. W. Rodford.)

Figure 60. Megaselia scalaris. (A) Left face of male hypopygium. (B) Female abdominal tergites 5–7. Scale bars: 0.1 mm.

Figure 61. Megaselia scalaris female. (A) Furca. (B) Left face of part of thorax to show mesopleuron and adjacent features (M, mid-mesopleural ridge; P, post-propleural ridge; N, posterior notopleural bristle; S, anterior spiracle). Scale bars: 0.1 mm.

Figure 62. Megaselia scalaris details of egg and third instar larva. (A) Left face of larval cephalopharyngeal skeleton and mandible. (B) Larval mandible. (C) Larval median tooth. (D) Dorsal view of egg. Scale bars: 0.1 mm.