There was a shit fly on the living room window.
I can’t help that the animal is called that. Its official Dutch name is: feather of the grass. His scientific surname sounds more dignified: Scatophaga. But translated from the ancient Greek, that means the same thing: shit eater.
It was a male. You can see this from a yellow-brown to a red-orange color. Females are more gray-green.
Why is the grass fly called that? Simple: because she likes to hang out around feces, with a special preference for fresh cow pies. Not because she eats it. Grass flies do not eat poop. The adult flies live on a solitary diet – a strange word, indeed, in this context; selfish perhaps? – captured insects, with different nectar. No, they like to hang out on and around herds of cows because they need them to reproduce.
The males gather around a new cow patch because they know that females with unfertilized eggs will be drawn there like a magnet when the time comes. Then it’s a matter of hitting quickly and doing ‘the action’, after which the woman deposits fertilized eggs in the machine. Weird eggs. They have projections that look like wings, so they look like little flies. These ‘wings’ have a special purpose: they must ensure that the eggs do not enter the new device immediately and suffocate.
The eggs – a female dung fly lays one hundred to two hundred – hatch after a day, two at most. The larvae then settle in the compost. On a well-appointed table, then? You would say so. For many insects, a piece of fresh cow is essentially one large collection of concentrated food. But not for the larvae of the fly. Because he doesn’t eat poop at all. However, other fly larvae that eat poop. Once the larvae have finished feeding, they pupate in the ground next to or under the cow piece, emerging a few days later as an adult fly.
There was a shit fly on the living room window. Shiny yellow-brown, the tinge of gold. Very beautiful, indeed. And I thought: couldn’t they have come up with another name for that? But yes, with poop on your paws no one likes you much…
To keep track of this week
Always fun: embracing nature. From blackberries, for example. It’s that time again. It is not forbidden to pick blackberries, as long as it doesn’t get too crazy. Nobody objects to a container for your own use. Many animals also love the juicy blackberries. deer and roe, for example. But also badgers, mice and foxes. Especially because of these foxes, some care is needed when picking blackberries. Some foxes can be infected with the foxworm, which can appear in their feces. The chance of contamination is very small, but the consequences are serious. Especially with low hanging blackberries, it is advisable to wash the fruit well after picking and better yet – delicious jam! – to cook.
2024-08-23 20:00:00
#nature #life #revolves #fresh #cow #pies
