Botfly

a family of parasitic flies. The horse botfly has the appearance of a honey bee with a lengthened abdomen pointed forward under the body. This botfly hovers about the legs of horses, attaching its eggs to the tip of hairs, where they can be reached readily by the horse who licks them off as they hatch and swallows them. The maggots hook themselves to the inner coat of the beast's stomach, and remain until full grown, when they pass out with the dung, and hide in the earth until the change or metamorphosis is complete. The maggots of a botfly that annoys the ox lodge in the throat in a similar way, and are found later burrowing under the skin of the back, but it is not understood as yet how they get there. A sheep botfly lays its eggs in nostrils of the sheep. The maggots live in the forehead and horns, often giving the sheep the "staggers." When full grown the maggots pass out through the nostrils into the earth. The grubs of other botflies infest rabbits, deer, squirrels, and reindeer. See Fly; Insect