Astegistidae
The family Astegistidae occurs worldwide except in Antarctica. These mites occur in soils of forests and in moist meadows and reeds.
- Innhold
- Characteristics
- Habitat and ecology
The family Astegistidae includes nine genera, one subgenus, and 54 species (Subías 2023).
Characteristics
The adults are usually small to medium sized (250–600 µm long) and brown. The prodorsum has converging lamellae with a long lamellar cusp. The rostrum is 3-pointed. The notogaster does not have pteromorphs, that are wing-like structures, it is glabrous or has 10 pairs of notogastral setae. The genital plates are large, and the distance between the genital and the anal plates is usually shorter than the length of the anal plates (Weigmann 2006, Norton and Behan-Pelletier 2009, Behan-Pelletier and Lindo 2023).
Habitat and ecology
Some Astegistidae species, like Cultroribula bicultrata (Berlese, 1905) described here, are characteristic of the organic layers of acidic forest soils, both in conifer and broadleaf forests. Others occur in moist meadows and reeds (Weigmann 2006, Behan-Pelletier and Lindo 2023). Some are parthenogenetic (Cultroribula species), which means that only females are present, and they are produced from unfertilized eggs, others [Furcoribula furcillata (Nordenskiöld, 1901)] reproduce sexually (Maraun et al. 2019). The time of development has not yet been studied.
References
Behan-Pelletier VM and Lindo Z (2023). Oribatid Mites. Biodiversity, Taxonomy and Ecology. CRC Press, 508 pp.
Maraun M, Caruso T, Hense J, Lehmitz L, Mumladze L, Murvanidze M, Nae I, Schulz J, Seniczak A and Scheu S (2019). Parthenogenetic vs. sexual reproduction in oribatid mite communities. Ecology and Evolution 9(12), 7324–7332. doi.org/10.1002/ece3.5303
Norton RA and Behan-Pelletier VM (2009). Suborder Oribatida. In: GW Krantz and DE Walter (eds.). A manual of Acarology, 3rd ed. Texas Tech. University Press Lubbock, 430–564.
Subías LS (2023). Listado sistemático, sinonímico y biogeográfico de los Ácaros Oribátidos (Acariformes, Oribatida) del mundo (1758−2002). Graellsia 2004, 60 (número extraordinario), 3−305. Updated 2023 – 18 actualization, 540 pp., access December, 2023.
Weigmann G (2006). Hornmilben (Oribatida). Die Tierwelt Deutschlands. 520 pp. Vol. 76, Goecke and Evers, Keltern.