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PENN STATE COLLEGE OF AGRICULTURAL SCIENCES COOPERATIVE EXTENSION SEARCH: go  Penn State  Extension   
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Script #: 6493
Topic: Insects and Pests
Category: Common Indoor Household Pests
Last Revised: 7/2007
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Filth Flies (6493)

Filth Fly image

Domestic flies, often called "Filth Flies," are not only a nuisance by their presence, but are important from a human and animal health standpoint. House flies may spread diseases such as conjunctivitis, poliomyelitis, typhoid fever, tuberculosis, anthrax, leprosy, cholera, diarrhea and dysentery. They may serve as intermediate hosts for parasitic tapeworms on poultry or parasitic roundworms on horses. Certain larvae of blow flies, bottle flies, screwworm flies and flesh flies may feed on dead as well as living tissue of mammals, causing blood poisoning and even death, especially in sheep. Stable flies bite painfully, sucking blood from humans and animals. False stable flies do not bite, but spread certain diseases, whereas the little house fly hovers in mid air in the middle of rooms.

For more information, please visit this Ohio State University fact sheet.

Penn State Enomology Dept.




For more information on this subject, Please visit the College of Agricultural Sciences Publications Web site.

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