Fig. 401.—Wing of Simulium.
Fig. 402.—Wing of Chironomus.
Family. Chironomidæ (Midges).
The Chironomidæ or midges are not only frequently mistaken for mosquitoes, but some are very annoying to man by biting him as mosquitoes do. They are easily distinguished from true mosquitoes (Culicidæ) by the following characters: (1) head small, often retracted under the cowl-like thorax; (2) no scales to the wings or body; and (3) the different arrangement of veins on the wings (fig. 402).
Two genera are important as annoying man, namely, Culicoides, Latreille, and Johannseniella, Williston. The larvæ of Chironomidæ are either aquatic, both fresh water and marine, and help to make the former foul,[399] according to Slater, or may, as in Ceratopogoninæ, live beneath the bark of trees, etc. The pupæ are very varied and also the life-histories of the different genera.[400] The blood-sucking habit is confined to the sub-family Ceratopogoninæ.
Sub-family. Ceratopogoninæ.