Taxon classification Animalia Diptera Calliphoridae

Chrysomya megacephala (Fabricius, 1794) Figs 2H, 3E

Records .

Madeira: Funchal ( Báez 1990).

Remarks.

Chrysomya megacephala is widely distributed over the Oriental and Australasian regions, also occurring in many neighbouring parts of the Palaearctic Region (Zumpt 1965). It was introduced in South America ( Guimarães et al. 1978), probably from southern Africa (Baumgartner and Greenberg 1984), and into the United States (Greenberg 1988). In Europe it is known from Spain ( Martínez-Sánchez et al. 2001), Portugal (Prado e Castro and García 2009), Malta (Ebejer 2007) and from the archipelagos of Madeira ( Báez 1990) and the Canaries ( Báez et al. 1981). Chrysomya megacephala is normally a faeces and carrion breeder (Zumpt 1965), considered a dangerous dipteran vector of pathogens (Wells 1991) and a major pest of fish products (Wall et al. 2001).