Sandfly or sand fly is a colloquial name for any species or genus of flying, biting, blood-sucking dipteran (fly) encountered in sandy areas. In the United States, sandfly may refer to certain horse flies that are also known as "greenheads" (family Tabanidae), or to members of the family Ceratopogonidae. The bites usually result in a small ...

In several countries, their common name is sandfly, but that name is also applied to other flies. The Phlebotominae include many genera of blood-feeding (hematophagous) flies, including the primary vectors of leishmaniasis, bartonellosis and pappataci fever.

These flies are densely covered with setae, have long slender legs, and broad and pointed wings that are held erect at rest (Lane 1993, Rutledge and Gupta 2009). The term sand fly also is applied to biting midges that belong to the family Ceratopogonidae and to black flies that are members of the family Simuliidae (Rutledge and Gupta 2009).

sand fly, any insect of the family Phlebotomidae (sometimes considered part of the family Psychodidae) of the order Diptera. The aquatic larvae live in the intertidal zone of coastal beaches, in mud, or in wet organic debris.

Sand fly adults are small flies – only about 3 mm long – and are golden, brownish or gray colored. They have long, piercing mouthparts that are well adapted for sucking blood from their selected host. Sand flies hold their hairy-looking wings in a vertical V-shape when at rest, a characteristic that distinguishes them from some other small flies.

There are about 700 species of phlebotomine sand flies of which about 70 are considered to transmit disease organisms to people (Adler and Theodor 1957). Sand flies are characterized by their densely hairy wings, giving them a moth-like appearance.

Phlebotomus is a genus of "sand flies" in the Diptera family Psychodidae. In the past, they have sometimes been considered to belong in a separate family, Phlebotomidae, but this alternative classification has not gained wide acceptance. [1]