Differences in morphometry and activity among
Tabanid fly assemblages in an Andean tropical montane cloud forest: Indication of altitudinal migration?
Hribar et al., "Relative susceptibility of beef and dairy calves to infection by bovine leukemia virus via
tabanid (Diptera: Tabanidae) feeding.," Journal of Medical Entomology, vol.
evansi is transmitted by a fly (mainly of the
tabanid family; Dequesnes, 2004), so that transmission by direct contact in agonistic encounters is not a factor.
Herbivores become infected when grazing on contaminated land, when bitten by
Tabanid flies with contaminated mouthparts, or by ingesting contaminated feed (2).
The best explanation for the iconic stripes' function turns out to be discouraging bloodthirsty
tabanid flies and tsetse flies, Caro and his colleagues report April 1 in Nature Communications.
Their next step was to compare these animals' geographic ranges with different variables, including woodland areas, ranges of large predators, temperature, and the geographic distribution of glossinid (tsetse flies) and
tabanid (horseflies) biting flies.
While in the field together they developed some novel collecting techniques for Tabanidae, one of which involved Pamela driving the vehicle in extra-low ratio while Brian would stalk along at the back and yell--STOP--followed by a crash as he swiped at a
tabanid. He would then slowly and carefully circle the car staring at the sides and tyres,
tabanids being attracted to the shadowed 'under belly' of the beast and the hot dark tyres.19 Over the following years Brian and Pamela had three children together, Ingrid (b.
Prevalence of the disease is presumably related to the density of definitive hosts as well as the abundance of
tabanid vectors.
As such, most of the dipteran species collected are generally associated with decay and fungus, although two
tabanid species were collected.
Conservation effort to preserve blood feeders of vertebrates would be challenging, especially with the South African
tabanid pollinators of Disa species about which so little is known (Goldblatt & Manning, 2000).