Geruchsorientierung der Stubenfliege Musca domestica L.¹

Abstract

Summary Based on morphological and histological investigations it was proved in a number of experiments that the house‐fly (Musca domestica) having a small number of olfactory organs, percepts sources of smell for short distances only. It was shown, however, that flies are strongly attracted to a great many products of various scents, some of wich are devoid of any nutritivnal value. In addition, the flies are able to detect abundant sources of food by means of olfactory stimuli of the antennae as well as by hydrotaxy and thermotaxy. Furthermore, there is a secondary optically piloted ”herd instinct„ manifesting that motionslessly feeding flies attract to the nutrional source more flies over a fairly wide distance. The so called ”fly‐factor„ of Barnhart and Chadwick (1935) is based on this particular gregarious behaviour. It is concluded from the experiments, that baits based on smell alone are of little promise in house‐fly control.

The Presence of Conspecific Decoys Enhances the Attractiveness of an NaCl Resource to the Yellow-Spined Locust,Ceracris kiangsu

“…One possible mechanism to improve an individual's chance finding puddling substrates is to search for conspecifics that may be puddling and join them. Joining behavior has been demonstrated in the context of puddling for several species of Lepidoptera, such as Appias albino ( Gadagkar 2006 ), several Pieridae species ( Beck et al 1999 ), Battus philenor and Papilio glaucus ( Arms et al 1974 , Otis et al 2006 ), and have also been found in various ecological/behavioral contexts for some species of Hemiptera ( Kidd 1976 ), Orthoptera ( Muller 1998 ), Coleoptera ( Raffa et al 1993 ), Diptera ( Barnhart and Chadwick 1953 , Wiesmann 1962 , Spivak et al 1991 , McCall and Cameron 1995 , Collins and Bell 1996 , Pinero and Prokopy 2004 ), and Hymenoptera ( Fowler 1992 , Reid et al 1995 , Raveret Richter and Tisch 1999 , D'Adamo et al 2000 ).…”

The function of the wild carrot's dark central floret: attract, guide or deter?

“…Like Detto (1905), Rothschild (1972), Yeo (1972) and Goulson et al (2009), he interpreted the dark central floret as mimicry of a resting or feeding insect, which entices more insects to land on the umbel. Based on the observations of Wiesemann (1962) and Wickler (1968), who claimed that flies prefer surfaces that are already covered by other flies, he assumed a 'flycatcher effect'. He deduced that the dark central floret 'plays a significant role in the pollination of these umbelliferae' (Eisikowitch 1980).…”

Luring houseflies (Musca domestica) to traps: do cuticular hydrocarbons and visual cues increase catch?

“…Problems with exces-sive housefly populations are generally associated with livestock units and landfill sites used for domestic waste Howard, 2001;Winpisinger et al , 2005 ) and fly populations seem likely to increase with the projected warming of Earth ' s climate ( Goulson et al , 2005 ). The public health risks and annoyance associated with large housefly populations are therefore substantial and efforts to control the species have been the focus of considerable research for several decades ( Wiesmann, 1962;Mitchell et al , 1975;Carlson & Leibold, 1981;Chapman et al , 1999;Hanley et al , 2004 ). Abstract .…”

“…Although Richter et al (1976) reported increased housefly attraction using targets painted with a regular spacing of black spots, Chapman et al (1999) found that clustered groups of black spots were more effective still as they may mimic feeding groups of flies. Wiesmann (1962) first suggested that clustered groups of individuals were the principal optical cue involved in the location of food resources for houseflies.…”