Drosophila: Non-Hawaii Invasives V

Found around the world, drosophila is a genus of small, familiar flies within the family Drosophilidae (Order: Diptera) commonly known as fruit flies. Despite their common name, drosophila feed on the microbiota found on rotting or fermenting fruits and not the fruit itself, leading to their association with these substrates. This distinguishes them from true fruit flies in the family Tephritidae which actually feed on the fruit. Less common names include pomace, wine or vinegar flies, all of which involve fermenting fruits. Drosophila melanogaster, the poster-child for the genus, is a valuable model organism in genetics and developmental biology and has become synonymous with the term "fruit fly" in the literature. Despite the widespread appeal of this species, there are actually more than 1,500 species of drosophila with diverse morphologies and behaviors. Wing patterns, courtship behaviors and oviposition mediums are commonly used to distinguish between species. Drosophila suzukii, which has a highly sclerotized ovipositor, can utilize younger fruits making them a major agricultural pest in many parts of the world. Please help the UHIM transcribe this selection of invasive drosophila specimens collected on, but not native to, the Hawaiian Islands! The total number of tasks for this dataset is: 532, number transcribed is 532 and number validated is 0. This data resource is harvested periodically into the main occurrence index.