Life Cycle
Phorid flies develop from eggs into larval, and pupal stages before emerging as adults. The female lays from one to 100 tiny eggs at a time in or on the larval food. She can lay up to 750 eggs in her lifetime. The time it takes from egg to adult varies on the species, but the average is about 25 days.
The larvae emerge in 24 hours and feed for a period between 8 and 16 days, before crawling to a drier spot to pupate. The phorid fly's egg-to-adult life cycle can be as short as 14 days, but may take up to 37 days.
Many species of phorid fly are specialist parasitoids of ants, but several species in the tropics are parasitoids of stingless bees. These affected bees are often host to more than one fly larva, and some individuals have been found to contain 12 phorid larvae.
Read more about this topic: Phorid Fly
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