Local naturalist George Foster will share his lifetime love for snail-killing or marsh flies, a family of highly evolved flies in the superfamily Sciomyzidae. Adult female flies lay their eggs in water or on vegetation near the water where snails are found. The larvae hatch and quickly attack freshwater or terrestrial snails or their eggs. Immature individuals of a few species attack slugs or fingernail clams. Snail-killing flies have been used as biological control of pest snails in those parts of the world where they are vectors for diseases.
At the age of 15, George Foster started discovering the natural world of insects. His brother was attending the University of Maryland, College Park, and taking an introductory entomology course. One of the requirements of the course was to make an insect collection. George’s brother asked him for help, and a passion for insects was born. Homing in on flies, George has now been collecting for over 40 years. That collection will soon find a permanent home at the Natural History Society of Maryland, where it will be used to teach and learn.
George earned a B.S. in entomology from UMD but went into a 40-year career in scientific instruments and lab equipment. Missing entomology, George contacted a mentor at the Smithsonian and began doing projects in the mid-1990s, including several papers on beach flies, sun flies (from the beautiful Southwestern US), marsh flies, and now grass flies (a difficult family of tiny flies). George has described and named a little over 40 new species of flies so far.
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