eye fly

eye fly,

common name for a group of small fliesfly,
name commonly used for any of a variety of winged insects, but properly restricted to members of the order Diptera, the true flies, which includes the housefly, gnat, midge, mosquito, and tsetse fly.
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 of the family Chloropidae. Eye flies are common in parts of California and in the S United States. They inhabit grasslands and meadows and breed mainly on decaying matter and excrement. Eye flies are attracted to animal secretions such as are found in the eyes, mouth, and open wounds. Some are thought to carry diseases such as conjunctivitisconjunctivitis
, inflammation or infection of the mucosal membrane that covers the eyeball and lines the eyelid, usually acute, caused by a virus or, less often, by a bacillus, an allergic reaction, or an irritating chemical.
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; West Indian species may transmit yawsyaws
or frambesia,
tropical infection of the skin caused by a spirochete (Treponema pertenue) closely related to that causing syphilis. Yaws, however, is not a sexually transmitted disease, i.e.
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, a disease caused by a spirochete. Eye flies are classified in the phylum ArthropodaArthropoda
[Gr.,=jointed feet], largest and most diverse animal phylum. The arthropods include crustaceans, insects, centipedes, millipedes, spiders, scorpions, and the extinct trilobites.
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, class Insecta, order Diptera, family Chloropidae.