This story was originally published in June 2023.
Our world would be a very different place if not for maggots. Ecosystems would be starved of nutrients. The landscape would be littered with the bodies of the dead — animals and plants.
That’s because maggots play a crucial role in decomposition — the process of breaking down dead organic tissue and getting its carbon, water and minerals back into circulation so living plants and animals can use them.
“They can break down 60 percent of a body in just a few days,” said Jim Dill, pest management expert at University of Maine Cooperative Extension. “They are very fast at decomposition.”
Maggots are also very good at devouring kitchen scraps, manure and other items people compost. Not only do maggots speed the composting process, they help attract fungi and bacteria that are beneficial to compost.
“They are breaking everything down and that is important for nutrient transport,” Dill said. “That maggot manure contains elements that help break down organic matter further and that can be used by other living organisms.”
The maggot’s digestive process helps liquify and further break down organic matter.
Maggots are the larval stage of flies like the common housefly and the blow fly, both of which lay their rapidly developing eggs on dead or decaying matter sometimes within hours after the organic material becomes available.
Those hatching eggs can become thousands of maggots that stay together in what is commonly called a “maggot mass.”
With that many maggots eating and digesting at the same time, it can create temperatures upwards of 120-degrees fahrenheit in the mass. That heat helps speed up the rate of decomposition.
Every part of the maggot’s anatomy is designed to feast and digest decaying organic matter.
On one end is a mouth equipped with tiny black hooks the maggot uses to tear off pieces of whatever it’s eating. The food is then worked through the internal digestive system and comes out the insect’s back end — almost like a conveyor belt of nutrient goo.
In addition to the anus, the rear of the maggot is also where its breathing apparatus — known as the spiracles — are located.
“Because they are often in such a liquid host they need to have that [back] end sticking out so they can breathe — like a snorkel,” Dill said. “That way they can burrow into the host and eat.”
