Alternate name: Fruit Fly

Family: Drosophilidae, Pomace Flies view all from this family

Description 1/16" (2 mm). Body short in proportion to oval wings. Brownish yellow with dark crossbands on last 3 abdominal segments in male. Eyes bright red. Legs brownish yellow; front tarsi of male have black "sex combs," important in courtship. Male's abdomen rounded, female's pointed. Feathery bristle (arista) at tip of antennae.

Food Adult drinks nectar and other sugary solutions. Larva feeds on yeasts in fermenting juices.

Life Cycle Female lays up to 200 slender grayish-white eggs, each with 2 short respiratory tubes projecting above surface of moist food. Eggs hatch in 2 days. Larvae creep to drier sites and transform to adults in 4-5 days. Adults are ready to mate in 2 days and live 2 weeks. Surviving male may mate with its own daughters, but female seldom produces fertile eggs with sons.

Habitat Ponds, marshes, and swamps on wet decaying plant matter; on rotting fruit; also in homes.

Range Worldwide.

Discussion These flies are so named because of their attraction to the sour odor of fermentation and bacterial waste. They are alternately known as "Pomace Flies" because the sour odor comes from pomace - the liquid squeezed from crushed fruit or seeds. Thomas Hunt Morgan at Columbia University made these flies famous by discovering genetic principles in their reproduction, for which he received the Nobel Prize in 1933.