We're the Flies
Yesterday's post was about insects that are not flies but have "fly" in their names, potentially confusing their place in taxonomy. Today I'm going to show some of the true flies ( order Diptera ) out there. Note that I encounter lots of members of the true flies of which I don't have pictures. Gnats are awfully small and frequently in flight. And when I'm meeting mosquitoes and deer flies, I'm usually trying to swat them before getting bitten rather than trying to photograph them. Finally, I've just had trouble confirming IDs for many crane flies. Having said that, hopefully this will give you some sense of the diversity of this group of insects. Let's start with bristle flies (aka Tachinid flies), though the first doesn't look as bristly as the second. As larva, these flies generally grow by slowly eating another insect species; as adults many are pollinators. Sometimes they're considered beneficial because they help control destructive...