Nursing on White. Sarcophaga carnaria, Flesh or Checkerboard Fly, on European Strawberry, Rubus idaeus, Hortus Botanicus, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
There's an ancient Greek story that when the great god Zeus was born on Crete his father Cronos wanted to devour him. His nurse Ida, having hidden him, feared that his hungry dad would hear the infant's cries. She soothed him with sweet white berries. Picking them she scratched her breast and the dripping blood changed the pale berries into Red Raspberry. Zeus, of course, survived. And much later in literary history he's called 'Lord of flies and death' by Jean-Paul Sartre (1905-1980) in his play Les Mouches.
In the photo appropriately, a Flesh Fly is quietly licking a white sepal of luscious Red Raspberry.
Nursing on White. Sarcophaga carnaria, Flesh or Checkerboard Fly, on European Strawberry, Rubus idaeus, Hortus Botanicus, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
There's an ancient Greek story that when the great god Zeus was born on Crete his father Cronos wanted to devour him. His nurse Ida, having hidden him, feared that his hungry dad would hear the infant's cries. She soothed him with sweet white berries. Picking them she scratched her breast and the dripping blood changed the pale berries into Red Raspberry. Zeus, of course, survived. And much later in literary history he's called 'Lord of flies and death' by Jean-Paul Sartre (1905-1980) in his play Les Mouches.
In the photo appropriately, a Flesh Fly is quietly licking a white sepal of luscious Red Raspberry.