[American cutaneous leishmaniasis: sandflies from the transmission area in the town of Teodoro Sampaio, the southeastern region of São Paulo state, Brazil].

Sandflies were captured in a secondary forest zone in the county of Teodoro Sampaio, São Paulo, during 12 months as from May 1994. Two houses located respectively at 240 m and 850 m from the semi-deciduous forest were selected. Night Center of Disease Control trap captures were performed fortnightly from twilight to dawn intradomiciliarily, in the edge and the interior of the forest and in the peridomicile of each one of the houses. Captures were realized as well in the peridomicile using Shannon traps during 6 hour for 24 captures and 4 quarter captures from twilight to dawn. The dominant species was Lutzomyia intermedia (93.5%). A larger number of insects were captured in the traps located in the edge of the forest. In the peridomicile of both houses an equivalent number of insects were captured, although a clear predominance of males was observed in the more distant located house. In the interior of the house located near the forest a larger number of specimens predominantly female were captured. L. intermedia and L. whitmani peaks occurred in the first hour and were characteristically more abundant in May, September and December when the mean temperature varied from 21 to 25.7 degrees C and the pluviometric index as from 66.7 to 195.1 mm.