Some members of the public living near landfills perceive the sites as a so
urce of nuisance flies and their associated diseases. Both these factors co
ntribute to frequent complaints to Environmental Health Officers about land
fill operations. Fly monitoring using sticky targets was done at a working
landfill site in the West Midlands in order to identify the key species of
flies present at the site, and to establish whether these flies were simila
r to those occurring in the surrounding area. Targets were positioned in co
ncentric rings, radiating away from the working face into the surrounding r
esidential area. The abundance of the flies, both in and around the landfil
l site was monitored over a 6-week period commencing 16 August 1999.
The key families of flies present on targets on the landfill site were Musc
idae, principally Musca domestica L. (common housefly), Calliphoridae, (pri
marily 'blue' and 'green' bottles), and Sarcophagidae (flesh flies). In con
trast, the families of flies found on targets immediately outside the worki
ng landfill site and in the nearby surrounding area, were largely vegetatio
n-feeding or parasitic flies, together with other non-fly insects. The over
, all abundance of all flies increased significantly during the monitoring
period.