Descriptions of Three New Species of Mites Phoretic upon Native Bees

Abstract

Three sarcoptiform mites, Caloglyphus boharti, Glyphanoetus nomiensis, and Histiostoma inquilinus, are described herein. The first is known to associate only with the alkali bee, Nomia melanderi Ckll., in central Wyoming, the second with N. melanderi in Wyoming and with N. nortoni Cress, in southern Louisiana, and the third with Xenoglossa strenua (Cress.) in Maryland. The small enclosed environment of the earthen, wooden, waxy, or leafy cells of native bees provides interesting opportunity for the study of coenetics in a microecosystem. Many, perhaps most, animal species in such an ecosystem are mites, these distributed into various trophic levels. Various species of bacteria and fungi constitute the flora. The actual food of acarine consumers is difficult to determine, but some clearly seem fungivorous, others saprophagous. Most of these mites are distributed by the bees whose nests they inhabit, and nearly all possess a specialized developmental stage in which they are relatively well-equipped to survive those periods of exposure to elevated temperatures and comparative drought en- countered during dispersal. All described here are phoretic in a greatly modified third nymphal instar termed the hypopus. This paper is the first of a series dealing with the systematics, ethology, and interrelationships of certain species inhabiting the cells of the alkali bee. The terminology utilized in the descriptions of G. nomiensis, H. inquilinus, and in the hypopus of C. boharti follows that of Hughes and Jackson (1958) except that the median slitlike opening between coxae IV is called the genital opening. Setal designations for the adults of C. boharti are those of Tiirk and Tiirk (1957). All measurements are in microns. Descriptions are based on type specimens, the range of variation within the type series following in parentheses.