Türkiye'den Yeni Kaydedilen bir Gymnodamaeid Akar (Acari, Oribatida, Gymnodamaeidae)

Abstract

The knowledge of the oribatid mite fauna of Türkiye is very limited. In order to make contribution to the Turkish soil mite fauna samples were collected from Kocaeli province and the Gymnodamaeid mites systematically evaluated. Gymnodamaeid mites are cosmopolitan except Australia and Antarctica and they tend to live in dry habitats like alpine, tundra and grasslands. Members of this family usually inhabit in soil but some tend to live on moss, algae and lichen and so they supposed as phytophagous. The taxonomy of the Gymnodamaeid mites is difficult because of incomplete descriptions or misinterpretations. This is due to the fact that some authors try to dissolve the cerotegument layer or prefer newly molted samples for study. However thick, ornamented cerotegument provides useful in species recognition in undamaged, mature adults. So the scanning electron microscopic investigation is almost mandatory in the study of Gymnodamaeid mites. The number of Gymnodamaeid species previously recorded from Turkiye is just restricted to five. The samples are collected in May 2019 from pine forest in Sarıcaali town of Kocaeli province of Turkey. The Gymnodamaeid mite species Adrodamaeus striatus (Aoki, 1984) is newly recorded from Turkey by this study. This species previously known from South Eastern Palearctic and North of Oriental. Scanning electron microscopy images of the species is firstly presented by this study.