Insights on plant mite occurrence in natural vegetation remnants from Brazil

Abstract

Brazil is a mega-diverse country, yet several invertebrate groups remain poorly-known. In order to assess the current state of knowledge about species that dwell on natural vegetation and highlight the main taxonomic patterns in these studies we reviewed biological surveys for plant mites in remnants of natural vegetation of Brazil. We found 35 publications of plant mites in natural ecosystems encompassing 75 sites in 51 municipalities and 13 states. Altogether we compiled 453 mite species belonging to 181 genera and 40 families. The most diverse families were Phytoseiidae (115), Tarsonemidae (60) and Tetranychidae (52), however, only 216 mite species (47.6%) were identified to species level. Among the 10 most diverse mite families, Phytoseiidae was the most taxonomically well-known family in natural systems (87.82% identified to species level) while Ascidae was the most problematic (only 6.2%). The most common mite species was Euseius citrifolius Denmark and Muma (Phytoseiidae), which was recorded at 35 sites. The number of mites recorded in Atlantic Forest, Cerrado, and Amazon were 191, 70 and 18 species, respectively. Our analysis suggests a high degree of subsampling of plant mite species for all Brazilian biomes, which hold great potential for possessing high species richness of plant mites, including several undescribed species. We corroborate previous studies that highlight the limited knowledge about mite diversity in Brazilian natural vegetation, and recommend that major efforts be made to more accurately assess the true plant mite diversity in remnants of natural vegetation in Brazil.