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Vol. 53, 2014
A new genus and species of the family Microdispidae (Acari:
Prostigmata) associated with Oryctes
nasicornis (Coleoptera:
Scarabaeidae) and redescription of the monotypic genus Vietodispus Mahunka, 1975
Hamidreza
Hajiqanbar* and Farahnaz Hosseininaveh
Department
of Entomology, Faculty of Agriculture, Tarbiat Modares University,
14115-336 Tehran, Iran
Abstract
Background: Mites of the family
Microdispidae (Acari: Prostigmata: Heterostigmata) are fungivorous,
usually living in soil, litter, decaying plant materials, and similar
substrates, and adult females have phoretic associations with
arthropods, particularly insects. The family Microdispidae is poorly
studied, and because of the vague descriptions of most of the genera
and species, the taxonomy of this family is in a state of confusion.
Previous to this study, more than 109 microdispid species in 17 genera
have been described worldwide.
Results: In this study, a new genus, Neomicrodispus gen. nov. (Acari:
Microdispidae) (type species Neomicrodispus
iranicus sp. nov.) is
described and illustrated based on phoretic females recovered from
Oryctes nasicornis (Coleoptera: Scarabaeidae), which were collected
from the forests in northern Iran. Also, the monotypic genus Vietodispus Mahunka, 1975 (type
species Vietodispus calcaratus) is redescribed based on
its holotype lent from the Hungarian Natural History Museum. The
representatives of the family Microdispidae associated with arthropods
are reviewed.
Conclusions: There are now 18
genera of this family worldwide that are primarily defined by
reductions in their morphology. Because of poor description of some
genera and species, synonymies or decreasing in systematic ranks may be
expected. A review of arthropod associations, provided in this paper,
showed that these mites are primarily associated with ants and beetles,
where a rich source of various kinds of fungi particles is easily
obtained.
Key words: Heterostigmata; Mite; Neomicrodispus gen. nov.; Beetle;
Phoretic relationship; Iran.
*Correspondence: E-mail: hajiqanbar@modares.ac.ir
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