Any of numerous small flies of the family Cecidomyiidae, whose larvae cause the formation of galls in plants.
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Any of a family (Cecidomyiidae) of tiny midges that often produce galls on plants.
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Any insect of the Cecidomyiidae family, whose larvae damage crops and other plants, creating galls on the stems and other fleshy parts.
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Other Word Forms
Noun
Singular:
gall-midge
Plural:
gall-midges
Gall-midge Sentence Examples
Metchnikoff observed (1866) in the development of the parthenogenetic eggs produced by the precocious larva of the gall-midge Cecidomyia that a large " polar-cell " appeared at one extremity during the primitive cellsegmentation.
Wagner made his classical observations on the production of larvae from unfertilized eggs developed in the precociouslyformed ovaries of a larval gall-midge (Cecidomyid), and subsequent observers have confirmed his results by studies on insects of the same family and of the related Chironomidae.
P. Marchal has (1904) described this power in two small parasitic Hymenoptera - a Chalcid (Encyrtus) which lays eggs in the developing eggs of the small moth Hyponomeuta, and a Proctotrypid (Polygnotus) which infests a gall-midge (Cecidomyid) larva.
It lives in the grub of a gall-midge and it ultimately becomes changed into the usual white and fleshy hymenopterous larva.