### animal | arthropod | insect:

Mayfly
* Many mayflies are intolerant of changes in water quality.
* Mayflies Learn about their identification, life cycle and habits
  - accumulate around lights, making roads, streets, sidewalks, etc. slippery and dangerous
* Mayflies also provide important clues to water quality
  - tend to have more fine gills than caddis or stoneflies so are more sensitive
* Mayflies are about an inch or two long with paper-thin wings and big, beady eyes
  - adults after they hatch
* Mayflies are also important food organisms for fish
  - on the water
  - very abundant in their habitat, providing food for many predators
  - among the easiest aquatic insects to identify
  - an important part of the diet for many species of fish
* Mayflies are aquatic animals that have amazing wings to fly with
  - insects that coexist with trout and other fishes in Virginia's streams
  - attracted to light
  - categorized in several different ways, most starting with their method of locomotion
* Mayflies are common and important members of the benthic community in most streams
  - insects found in almost all freshwater habitats, as well as some brackish ones
  - dependent upon clean water for their habitat
  - extremely important in the aquatic food web
  - insects that are aquatic as larvae and emerge as flying adults
  - one of the most elegant of the species in the world of fly fishing
  - really beautiful, being colored and having long wings
  - the main source of food
* Mayflies are the most intolerant species of metals contaminated water
  - primitive winged insects
  - only group of insects that molt after they have wings
* Mayflies are the only insects that molt after developing functional wings
  - molt after they are able to fly
  - molt after winged forms have been produced
  - which molt once they reach the adult stage
* Mayflies are unique in having a pre-adult winged stage
  - two winged stages, the subimago and imago
  - that they undergo a final moult after the wings have formed
  - insects in that they have two adult stages
  - used extensively as indicators of pollution and environmental change
  - become nuisances
  - begin their life underwater, burrowed into lake sediment
  - come around for different seasons in each state
  - emerge as adults, mate, and lay their eggs in the space of about three days
  - enter stages
  - feed only as larvae
  - generally live where there is water
  - get their name from the springtime appearance of large numbers of the adult flies
  - hatch from eggs that are laid in ponds or rivers
* Mayflies have a large number of postembryonic molts
  - unique life history, throughout which they are preyed upon by trout
* Mayflies have a very interesting life cycle
  - short but interesting life cycle
  - an important ecological role
  - characteristics
  - compound eyes
  - distinct and finite emergence periods, especially in temperate and arctic areas
  - fringed gills on their abdomen instead of finger-like gills
  - front wings
  - functions
* Mayflies have large compound eyes
  - forewings, small hindwings that are held together at rest over the body
  - similarity
  - the shortest lifespan on Earth
  - thin bodies and long tails
  - triangular wings
  - two or three long, antenna-like appendages at the end of the abdomen
  - very distinct characteristics
  - hold the wings together above their body when they are resting
* Mayflies includes air sacs
  - brains
  - carapaces
  - cell membranes
  - cells
  - corpi
  - cytoplasm
  - ears
  - faces
  - flight feathers
  - heads
  - nuclei
  - plasma membranes
  - quill feathers
  - sections
  - shells
  - skulls
  - thoraxes
  - vacuoles
  - inhabit all types of freshwater where the oxygen supply is good
  - lack a pupal stage in their development
  - live for only a few hours after they hatch
* Mayflies live in areas
  - every part of the world except the Arctic and Antarctic regions
  - same areas
  - on land as adults, but are entirely aquatic as nymphs
  - mate in swarms and the females return to the lakes to lay their eggs
  - mature like lightning and die by day's end
  - molt after they hatch
  - multiply slower
* Mayflies only feed while they are in the stage of being nymphs
  - have one set
  - pass the winter in the nymph state emerging as adults during spring and summer months
  - rise from the surface of the Mississippi River to mate a handful of times every summer
  - serve as food for many fishes and predaceous insects, such as dragonflies
* Mayflies spend a year awaiting their birth, and then most die after living just one day
  - most of their lifetime as nymphs
* Mayflies spend most of their lives in larval form
  - in the water as eggs and larvae
  - start out as eggs in the mud of the river or lake, regardless of the species
* Mayflies swarm a few times each summer to mate and hatch
  - in the air
  - usually have feathery gills that are very sensitive to water pollution
* Most mayflies become nuisances
* Most mayflies have characteristics
* Most mayflies live in areas
* Some mayflies eat phytoplankton.
* Some mayflies emerge from yards
  - in stages
* Some mayflies go through incomplete metamorphosis
  - live in patches
  - perfer running water over still water