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The fauna of free-living mites (Acari) of Greenland

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Abstract

When compiling The Greenland Entomofauna. An Identification Manual of Insects, Spiders and Their Allies (ed. by J. Böcher and N.P. Kristensen), the mite collections kept at the Zoological Museum of the University of Copenhagen were processed. As a result, illustrated keys and a photo atlas of the genera were prepared. An analysis of the type material preserved in the Museum allowed three taxa of Mesostigmata to be synonymized: Vulgarogamasus immanis (Berlese, 1903) = Parasitus fucicola Trägårdh, 1904 syn. n.; Pneumolaelaps groenlandicus (Trägårdh, 1904) = Hypoaspis (Pneumolaelaps) arctos Karg, 1984 syn. n.; Zercon hammerae Sellnick, 1960 = Z. thulium Athias-Henriot, 1980 syn. n. The number of mite species known in Greenland increased from 158 to 290 (59 species were identified only to the generic level). They belong to the orders Parasitiformes (Mesostigmata 63 species, Ixodida 1) and Acariformes (Prostigmata 94, Endeostigmata 5, Oribatida 110, Astigmata 17). The free-living mite fauna in general is characterized by a complete taxonomic structure and a full range of ecological diversity. The Greenland fauna of oribatid mites mainly consists of widespread polyzonal species (70%) while specialized cryobiont (arctic and arctomontane) species are few (4%); the Nearctic species prevail over the European invaders with a ratio of 1.5: 1. On the contrary, the gamasid mite fauna includes only 25% of widespread species; the cryobiont elements comprise up to 45%; the ratio of the species of Nearctic and Palaearctic origin is 1: 4.

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Original Russian Text © O.L. Makarova, 2014, published in Zoologicheskii Zhurnal, 2014, Vol. 93, No. 12, pp. 1404–1419.

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Makarova, O.L. The fauna of free-living mites (Acari) of Greenland. Entmol. Rev. 95, 108–125 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1134/S0013873815010133

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