About this Tool

Built by Even Dankowicz, this workspace is designed to streamline the identification of Lucilia flies by combining a character-based matrix with the iNaturalist verification queue. Select traits from the menu to filter matching species and generate a diagnostic narrative.

A few important functions that may not be obvious:

• Authenticating your iNat account with the iNat API unlocks a set of functions equivalent to the 'Identify' tool.
• If your ID is above species level and the same as the new community ID, the 'Post Results' button will mark "Based on the evidence, can the Community Taxon still be confirmed or improved?" as "No, it's as good as it can be."
• If your ID is not an agreement with an existing species-level community ID, the 'Post Results' button will paste a description of your ID in a comment.
• Like in the 'Identify' tool, clicking on the current community ID will open the observation in a new tab.
• Clicking on your username in the top left will open your 'identifications' page on iNaturalist, in case you want to go back to an observation you've recently IDed.

Most of the features used in this key are explained in my illustrated guide to Greenbottle Flies (Calliphoridae: Lucilia) of the USA and Canada. Many features are also shown in Jones et al (2019), which is the best resource to start identifying specimens under a microscope. For my other fly ID resources, visit https://sites.google.com/view/flyguide/.

I refined this dataset by studying preserved specimens, live flies, and photos. A lot of the trait and distribution records were initially derived from the following references:

Falk, 2016. British Blowflies (Calliphoridae) and Woodlouse Flies (Rhinophoridae). Draft Key March 2016. https://quelestcetanimal-lagalerie.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/testkeytobritishblowflies132016.pdf

Hall, Townsend, 1977. The Blow Flies of Virginia (Diptera: Calliphoridae). Virginia Tech Research Division Bulletin 123.

Jones, Whitworth, Marshall, 2019. Blow flies of North America: Keys to the subfamilies and genera of Calliphoridae, and to the species of the subfamilies Calliphorinae, Luciliinae and Chrysomyinae. Canadian Journal of Arthropod Identification. 39. https://cjai.biologicalsurvey.ca/jwm_39/jwm_39.html

Marshall, Whitworth, Roscoe, 2011. Blow flies (Diptera: Calliphoridae) of eastern Canada with a key to Calliphoridae subfamilies and genera of eastern North America, and a key to the eastern Canadian species of Calliphorinae, Luciliinae and Chrysomyiinae. Canadian Journal of Arthropod Identification. 11.

Tantawi, Whitworth, 2014. First record of Lucilia bufonivora Moniez, 1876 (Diptera: Calliphoridae) from North America and key to North American species of the L. bufonivora species group. Zootaxa. 3881(2): 101-124

Whitworth, 2006. Keys to the Genera and Species of Blow Flies (Diptera: Calliphoridae) of North America north of Mexico. Proceedings of the Entomological Society of Washington. 108(3): 689-725.

Whitworth, 2010. Keys to the genera and species of blow flies (Diptera: Calliphoridae) of the WestIndies and description of a new species of Lucilia Robineau-Desvoidy. Zootaxa.

Whitworth, 2014. A revision of the Neotropical species of Lucilia Robineau-Desvoidy (Diptera: Calliphoridae). Zootaxa.

Williams, Villet, 2014. Morphological identification of Lucilia sericata, Lucilia cuprina and their hybrids (Diptera, Calliphoridae). ZooKeys 420. https://zookeys.pensoft.net/article/3908/