| By :
Jamie Simpson
The common name for an insect of the order Siphonaptera, the flea is an ancient species that lives off of the blood of mammals and birds. Today there are still contentions over exactly what this insect might have evolved from. Some researchers and taxonomists claim it is an off-shoot of the Diptera family, flies, others cite Aphaniptera due to that being an older name. The contention is that they might have evolved from the scorpionfly family Boreidae. There is further discussion that this tiny creature will be reclassed altogether into the Mecoptera family line. What does all this mean? It means that taxonomists don't really know what to make of this creature's origins. Beyond that simple statement there is no doubt of the flea's success as a species and widespread nature. These insects are very small creatures that range from one-sixteenth of an inch to one-eighth of an inch (one and a half to three and a third millimeters) long. For a human being to get a truly detailed look at the smallest of these creatures requires powerful magnifying equipment. They are generally dark, such as the reddish-brown coloration of the typical cat flea, and are wingless insects that survive off of piercing the flesh of another organism and siphoning off their blood for their own dietary needs. They accomplish this with tube like mouth parts that are capable of piercing the skin of the toughest of their chosen species to feed off of. Fleas are exceptionally well adapted creatures that have the second best jumping ability of any species in existence relative to body size. A typical flea can leap upwards into the air to a vertical height of seven inches eighteen centimeters) and to a horizontal distance of thirteen inches (thirty-three centimeters). This is overall equivalent to the capacity to leap two hundred times its body length straight across. Fleas are a hard shelled and adaptive species that are hard to kill without poison due to their body design and hard polished shell. A holometabolous species the flea goes through four life stages. These stages are egg, larva, pupa, and imago (the final adult stage). Once a flea is born it immediately begins attacking any available organic matter it can find. The typical fare is feces, dead insects, and vegetation. They avoid sunlight as much as possible preferring dark areas. They are also completely blind at this point. Within a month the infant flea is normally a fully grown adult and is ready to begin the reproduction of its species.
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