New species of water mites from Oman, with some zoogeographical notes (Acari: Hydrachnidia)

Abstract

-The paper deals with a collection of epigean water mites from Oman. One new genus, Omanaxonopsis, and 16 new species are described: Bharatavolzia arabica, Nilotonia bisetosa, N. longiseta, Torrenticola arabica, T. omanensis, Limnesia kochi, Protolimnesia inexspectata, Atractides arabicus, A. omanensis, Neumania indentata, Axonopsis arabica, A. balneatoris, A. omanensis, Omanaxonopsis arabica, Arrenurus dugesi and Arrenurus rectituberculatus. The zoogeographical position of Oman is discussed briefly.

A new species of Promicrodispus (Acari: Microdispidae) from the Altai Republic, Russia

“…The tiny structure (?) located posteriad eupathidlike seta is probably was discovered in Pygmephorus species (Pygmephoridae) and indicated by arrow in Figure 4 in Dastych and Rack (1993). This seta of unknown homology was also reported in Bembidiacarus (Khaustov, 2000).…”

“…The most expected is the presence of palpal solenidion ω. This solenidion is usually present in other pygmephoroid mites (Pygmephoridae, Neopygmephoridae, Scutacaridae) as well as in other early derivative Heterostigmata (Lindquist, 1986;Dastych and Rack, 1993). In P. altaicus Khaustov sp.…”

Water mites (Acari, Hydrachnidia) from Baishih River drainage in Northern Taiwan, with description of two new species

“…This species is very similar to Hygrobates soari K. Viets, 1911, a species widspread in the Afrotropical region, reaching in its distribution to northern Oman (Smit and Pešić 2010). As noted by Pešić et al (2012) additional material should be studied in order to get an insight into on further diagnostic differences of these two species, what probably will require the application of molecular techniques.…”

“…As Pešić et al (2010) noted the variability of additional populations tentatively assigned to Hydrodroma rheophila (e.g. from Greece and Oman, see Pešić et al 2010 and Smit and Pešić 2010, respectively) from different regions of the whole distribution area needs to be examined to clarify the taxonomy. This probably will require the use of molecular approach to examine the degree of genetic differentiation among the geographical populations.…”

A new species of Atractides Koch, 1837 (Acari: Hydrachnidia, Hygrobatidae) from Ethiopia, with a discussion on the biodiversity of the genus Atractides in the Afrotropical region

“… Distribution of freshwater mite species of Atractides per biogeographical provinces: PA–Palaearctic; NA–Nearctic; NT–Neotropical; AT–Afrotropical; OL–Oriental; AU–Australasian; PC–Pacific Oceanic Islands; AN–Antarctic. Biogeographical provinces are given according to Balian et al (2008) , modified to include northern Oman in the Oriental, and southern Oman in the Afrotropical region (see Smit and Pešić 2010 for discussion on the zoogeographical position of Oman). …”