Identification of a species of deer fly attacking human and live stocks in Assam, India

Abstract

During April 2018, a sudden appearance of some unknown flies was observed in some villages under Sibsagar district of Assam, Northeast India. The flies attacked in groups and had more attraction towards human than livestock. The present article describes the entomological and molecular identification of the fly at species level in Sibsagar district of Assam, northeast India. Preliminary examination revealed the fly to be an insect of order Diptera, Family Tabanidae and Genus Chrysops as they posses short proboscis, ocelli, third antennal joint with five divisions and wings demarcated with dark median cross-band. This was supported by molecular data where the partial nucleotide sequences of Mitochondrial COI gene revealed maximum identity (90.6%-92.3%) with genus Chrysops. The mitochondrial COI sequence data of Chrysops flavocinctus has been made available in NCBI Gen Bank. Gen Bank Accession No. MH998226.