Abstract

A new species and three new records of oribatid mites collected from soil/litter samples of Malappuram Dt. of Kerala, South India, are studied. Indoribates (Indoribates) irumbuzhiensis sp. nov. shares some morphological similarities with I. (I.) hauseri (Mahunka, 1997) and I.(I.) crassisetiger (Fukuyama & Aoki, 2000) described from Borneo and China respectively. However, the larger body size, smooth rostral setae, straight interlamellar setae, long and smooth notogastral setae, barbed/ciliate nature of genital setae, g4 and g5, distally pointed anal and adanal setae, and presence of basiventral tooth on tibia I and II keep its identity separate from the above two species. Identification key to all known species of subgenus Indoribates (Indoribates) is provided. The paper also include three new records of oribatid mites from India viz. Gibbicepheus (Gibbicepheus) kanekoi (Aoki 1958), Yoshiobodes (Yoshiobodes) camerunensis Fernández, Theron, Leiva & Tiedt.,2017 and Eupelops intermedius (Hammer, 1979), of which, Y. (Y) camerunensis is new record for the Oriental Region and first record of the genus from India.