New records of Parasitidae mites (Acari; Mesostigmata) in Korea

Abstract

Family Parasitidae is relatively large (many 1­2 mm) mite group with often yellowish to dark brown body color under the superfamily Parasitoidea in Cohort Gamasina of Mesostigmata among Acari (Lindquist et al., 2009). Known as predators, they feed on collembolans, dipter­ ous larvae, mites, nematodes and other small soil dwell­ ing animals. The family contains two subfamilies, the Parasitinae and Pergamasinae even with some disagree­ ments on the lower level taxonomy with broader (e.g. Micherdzinski, 1969; Tichmirov, 1969; Karg, 1993b) and narrower view (e.g. Evans and Till 1979; Athias­ Henriot, 1980; 1982b; Juvara­Bals, 2002). This study followed the concept of Athias­Henriot (1980; 1982b). In the subfamily Pergamasinae, male has the base of the tri­ tosternum covered by the genital operculum and female has an undivided dorsal shield. Deutonymphs are not phoretic (Evans, 1992). They commonly inhabit relative­ ly stable forest and grassland humus, moss, and soil eco­ systems (Bhattacharyya, 1963; Holzmann, 1969; Karg, 1993b). Some members of the genus Holoparasitus are associated with wet habitats, such as fresh and saltwater marshes and beach wrack (Hyatt, 1987; Karg, 1993b). In the subfamily Parasitinae, male has the base of the tri­ tosternum not covered by the genital operculum, and fe­ male has divided dorsal shields. They commonly occur in temporary accumulations of organic debris, including manure, vegetable compost and in the nest habitats of mammals and insects (Hyatt, 1980; Karg, 1993b). Deu­ tonymphs are often phoretic on dung­ or compost in­ habiting insects (Scarabaeidae), bark­inhabiting beetles (Cerambycidae), or ground­nesting bees (Rapp, 1959; Binns, 1982). The occurrence of these often conspicu­ ous mites on insect carriers was misconstrued as parasit­ ism by early observers and apparently led to their being named Parasitus and “Parasitids” (Oudemans, 1936a). Global diversity of Mesostigmata incompasses 100 families, 887 genera, 8,280 species, and that of Parasiti­ dae comprises 2 subfamily 32 genera, 363 species in the world (Hallan, 2005). In Korea, 29 families, 92 genera, 237 species of Mesostigmata were recorded with 2 sub­ family 6 genera, 22 species of Parasitidae (NIBR, 2013) (Table 1). Among those 20 species were recorded from North­ ern part of Korea by Athias­Henriot (1977; 1980), Daele (1975) and Tichomirov (1977), but two from Southern part of Korea by Choi (1994) and Korean zoological record (KSSZ, 1997). During the faunal study of soil predatory mites of diverse habitats in Southern part of Korea, 13 species of Parasitidae mites were recovered. Among those, four species of P. beta, P. fimetorum, P. insignis and Poecilochirus carabi are the new records to Korean peninsula (Fig. 1). Taxonomic details and other biological characteristics are reported.