Diptera of GSMNP
Diptera of GSMNP
The Diptera (flies) is one of the largest orders of insects, together with the Coleoptera, Hymenoptera, and Lepidoptera, and includes many of the most important medical/veterinary pests known to man, think of mosquitoes and the diseases they transmit! Their diversity in the GSMNP appears very high: a newly compiled, preliminary Diptera checklist includes nearly as many names as the Coleoptera checklist. We have extensively sampled Diptera in the Park since 1999 via over 2,000 trap-days of 6-meter Malaise trapping primarily at meadow-forest ecotones, and 100+ field days of hand collecting. This combination of trap type and habitat has generated bulk samples that are particularly rich in Diptera. Over 1,000 such samples are in storage at the Florida State Collection of Arthropods. Funding will allow the sorting of specimens to family, pinning, labeling, and distribution to specialists for identification, followed by entry of label data into the ATBI database.
Over 1,000 bulk 6-ft Malaise trap samples representing over 2,000 trap-days in GSMNP have been sorted to major and minor orders. Over 6,000 Diptera were pinned, labeled and sorted to 48 families. Over 5,000 of these specimens were made available to taxonomic specialists resulting in identification of 135 taxa, of which 68 are new GSMNP records and at least two are undescribed species.
