Tanopicobia gen. nov., a new genus of quill mites, its phylogenetic placement in the subfamily Picobiinae (Acariformes: Syringophilidae) and picobiine relationships with avian hosts.

Maciej Skoracki,Bozena Sikora,Leszek Jerzak,Martin Hromada,Feng Zhang

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0225982

Maciej Skoracki, Bozena Sikora + Show 3 more

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https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0225982

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Abstract

A new monotypic genus Tanopicobia gen. nov. is established for a new species Tanopicobia trachyphoni sp. nov., parasitizing Trachyphonus erythrocephalus Cabanis, 1878 (Piciformes: Lybiidae) from Tanzania. In phylogenetic analyses based on morphological data and constructed using the maximum parsimony approach, this taxon falls within the subfamily Picobiinae Johnston and Kethley, 1973 in the Neopicobia-species-group as closely related to the genus Pipicobia Glowska and Schmidt, 2014. Tanopicobia differs from Pipicobia by the following features in females: genital setae absent; setae ve are situated far and posteromedial to the level of setal bases vi; setae 3a are thick and knobbed. Additionally, a new generic key for subfamily Picobiinae is constructed and general host-parasite ecological and phylogenetic relationships are discussed. Picobiines are present in several lineages of neoavian birds, from basal Galloanseres to terminal Telluraves, which are infested by 70 (89.7% of all) species of these ectoparasites.

Highlights

The subfamily Picobiinae Johnston and Kethley, 1973 (Acariformes: Prostigmata: Cheyletoidea: Syringophilidae) represents taxonomically diverse group of obligate, permanent and highly specialized mite parasites of birds [1], occurring in all zoogeographical regions besides Antarctica [2]
Based on phylogenetic analysis of the family Syringophilidae, the picobiines are placed in the core of the syringophilid tree, and the subfamily Syringophilinae is paraphyletic with respect to this group [29]
It is worth to note that monoxenous C. lobatus represents the only species of the picobiine mite able to infest the quills of wing feathers, whereas all other genera occur entirely in contour feathers [1,3,4,24]

Summary

Introduction

The subfamily Picobiinae Johnston and Kethley, 1973 (Acariformes: Prostigmata: Cheyletoidea: Syringophilidae) represents taxonomically diverse group of obligate, permanent and highly specialized mite parasites of birds [1], occurring in all zoogeographical regions besides Antarctica [2]. They occupy exclusively short quills (calamus) of the contour feathers, except the enigmatic and monotypic genus Calamincola Casto, 1977 that is found in the quills of wing feathers of neotropical ani cuckoos [1,3,4].

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