Morphological ontogeny of Phauloppia nemoralis (Acari, Oribatida, Oribatulidae), with comments on Phauloppia Berlese

Abstract

The morphological ontogeny of Phauloppia nemoralis (Berlese, 1916) is described and illustrated. The adult of this species is most similar to Ph. incomperta (Pérez-Íñigo et Peña, 1996), but differs from it mainly by the shape of bothridial seta, porose areas Aa and A1, and location of porose area A1 and seta ad3. In the juveniles of Ph. nemoralis, the prodorsal setae ro, le and in are of medium size or long, ex is short, and the bothridial seta is of medium size and clavate, with barbed head. The larva has 12 pairs of gastronotal setae, the nymphs have 14 pairs; all are of medium size and barbed. In this species, the basal excentrosclerites occur, at setae c2, h1 and l-series in the larva, and c2, p1 and l- and h-series in the nymphs. In all nymphs, solenidion ω2 on tarsus I is longer and thinner than ω1, and seta ft'' is relatively long and located posterior to solenidion ω2.