The Melba Gully State Park was formed to protect a small pocket of natural rainforest in the Otway Ranges near Apollo Bay in Victoria, Australia. The 48-hectare (120-acre) park was extremely valuable as much of the rest of the Ranges has been burnt out many times by bushfires. The park now forms part of the Great Otway National Park.
The Bibionomorpha are an infraorder of the suborder Nematocera. One of its constituent families, the Anisopodidae, is the presumed sister taxon to the entire suborder Brachycera. Several of the remaining families in the infraorder are former subfamilies of the Mycetophilidae, which has been recently subdivided. The family Axymyiidae has recently been removed from the Bibionomorpha to its own infraorder Axymyiomorpha.
Glowworm or glow-worm is the common name for various groups of insect larvae and adult larviform females that glow through bioluminescence. They include the European common glow-worm and other members of the Lampyridae, but bioluminescence also occurs in the families Elateridae, Phengodidae and Rhagophthalmidae among beetles; as well as members of the genera Arachnocampa, Keroplatus and Orfelia among keroplatid fungus gnats.
Arachnocampa is a genus of nine fungus gnat species which have a bioluminescent larval stage, akin to the larval stage of glowworm beetles. The species of Arachnocampa are endemic to Australia and New Zealand, dwelling in caves and grottos, or sheltered places in forests.
The Nematocera are a suborder of elongated flies with thin, segmented antennae and mostly aquatic larvae. This group is paraphyletic and contains all flies but species from suborder Brachycera, which includes more commonly known species such as the housefly or the common fruit fly. Families in Nematocera include mosquitoes, crane flies, gnats, black flies, and multiple families commonly known as midges. The Nematocera typically have fairly long, fine, finely-jointed antennae. In many species, such as most mosquitoes, the female antennae are more or less threadlike, but the males have spectacularly plumose antennae.
Ceratopogonidae is a family of flies commonly known as no-see-ums, or biting midges, generally 1–3 millimetres in length. The family includes more than 5,000 species, distributed worldwide, apart from the Antarctic and the Arctic.
Psychodidae, also called drain flies, sink flies, filter flies, sewer flies, or sewer gnats, is a family of true flies. Some genera have short, hairy bodies and wings, giving them a "furry" moth-like appearance, hence one of their common names, moth flies. Members of the sub-family Phlebotominae, which are hematophagous, may be called sand flies in some countries, although this term is also used for other unrelated flies.
Fungus gnats are small, dark, short-lived gnats, of the families Sciaridae, Diadocidiidae, Ditomyiidae, Keroplatidae, Bolitophilidae, and Mycetophilidae ; they comprise six of the seven families placed in the superfamily Sciaroidea.
Arachnocampa luminosa, commonly known as New Zealand glowworm or simply glowworm, is a species of fungus gnat endemic to New Zealand. The larval stage and the imago produce a blue-green bioluminescence. The species is known to dwell in caves and on sheltered banks in native bush where humidity is high. Its Māori name is titiwai, meaning "projected over water".
The Mycetophilidae are a family of small flies, forming the bulk of those species known as fungus gnats. About 3000 described species are placed in 150 genera, but the true number of species is undoubtedly much higher. They are generally found in the damp habitats favoured by their host fungi and sometimes form dense swarms.
The Sciaridae are a family of flies, commonly known as dark-winged fungus gnats. Commonly found in moist environments, they are known to be a pest of mushroom farms and are commonly found in household plant pots. This is one of the least studied of the large Diptera families, probably due to the small size of these insects and the similarity among species.
Sciaroidea is a superfamily in the infraorder Bibionomorpha. There are about 16 families and more than 15,000 described species in Sciaroidea. Most of its constituent families are various gnats.
Athericidae is a small family of flies known as water snipe flies or ibis flies. They used to be placed in the family Rhagionidae, but were removed by Stuckenberg in 1973. They are now known to be more closely related to Tabanidae. Species of Athericidae are found worldwide.
Bolitophila is the sole living genus in the Bolitophilidae, a family of Diptera in the superfamily Sciaroidea, with around 40 Palaearctic and about 20 Nearctic species, and three species from the Oriental region (Taiwan). They are small (6–9 mm).
The Chloropidae are a family of flies commonly known as frit flies or grass flies. About 2000 described species are in over 160 genera distributed worldwide. These are usually very small flies, yellow or black and appearing shiny due to the virtual absence of any hairs. The majority of the larvae are phytophagous, mainly on grasses, and can be major pests of cereals. However, parasitic and predatory species are known. A few species are kleptoparasites. Some species in the genera Hippelates and Siphunculina are called eye gnats or eye flies for their habit of being attracted to eyes. They feed on lachrymal secretions and other body fluids of various animals, including humans, and are of medical significance.
A gnat is any of many species of tiny flying insects in the dipterid suborder Nematocera, especially those in the families Mycetophilidae, Anisopodidae and Sciaridae. They can be both biting and non-biting. Most often they fly in large numbers, called clouds. "Gnat" is a loose descriptive category rather than a phylogenetic or other technical term, so there is no scientific consensus on what constitutes a gnat. Some entomologists consider only non-biting flies to be gnats. Certain universities and institutes also distinguish eye gnats: the Smithsonian Institution describes them as "non-biting flies, no bigger than a few grains of salt, ... attracted to fluids secreted by your eyes".
Macrocera parva is a Palearctic species of 'fungus gnat' in the family Keroplatidae.Larvae of species in this genus have been reared from a range of situations including clumps of turf, rotting wood and cave walls and are thought to be predaceous.
Keroplatus is a genus of predatory fungus gnats in the family Keroplatidae. Several species are bioluminescent.
Lygistorrhininae, commonly called long-beaked fungus gnats is a subfamily of flies in the Diptera family Keroplatidae. The groups was long treated as a separate family, but molecular phylogenetic analysis has shown it to belong to Keroplatidae. There are about 7 genera and at least 30 described species in Lygistorrhininae.
Paleoplatyura is a genus of predatory fungus gnats in the family Keroplatidae. There are about seven described species in Paleoplatyura. Fossil species are known from the mid-Cretaceous Burmese amber of Myanmar, dating to around 100 million years ago.
