The ordinary housefly can manage to find enough food to live on almost anywhere. This is because of its tiny size and weight. A thousand adult flies weigh only about 25 to 30 grams.Houseflies do not eat solid- food, because they have no equipment for biting. The mouth parts of the fly are made for sucking up liquid food.
What looks like the fly's "tongue" is really a snout like the elephant' trunk. It has two lobes at the end which act as funnels for drawing in its liquid food. When a fly lands on a lump of sugar (or other soluble food) it spreads saliva on the sugar which makes it Liquid.
But don't houseflies bite people before a storm? This popular idea is incorrect. What happens is that other types of flies, sand flies or stable flies, are mistaken for houseflies. These flies are bloodsucking and so they do bite people.
If the housefly does not bite, why is it considered so dangerous to man? The claws, padded feet, and body arc covered with bristling hairs, and its tongue is coated with sticky glue. This means dust and dirt will cling to the fly. And since the housefly will look for its food anywhere, including garbage and sewage, the bacteria of various diseases may be in the dirt and dust (hat sticks to the fly. Then, if the fly touches the food we eat, these disease bacteria will enter our body.
What looks like the fly's "tongue" is really a snout like the elephant' trunk. It has two lobes at the end which act as funnels for drawing in its liquid food. When a fly lands on a lump of sugar (or other soluble food) it spreads saliva on the sugar which makes it Liquid.
But don't houseflies bite people before a storm? This popular idea is incorrect. What happens is that other types of flies, sand flies or stable flies, are mistaken for houseflies. These flies are bloodsucking and so they do bite people.
If the housefly does not bite, why is it considered so dangerous to man? The claws, padded feet, and body arc covered with bristling hairs, and its tongue is coated with sticky glue. This means dust and dirt will cling to the fly. And since the housefly will look for its food anywhere, including garbage and sewage, the bacteria of various diseases may be in the dirt and dust (hat sticks to the fly. Then, if the fly touches the food we eat, these disease bacteria will enter our body.
