Abstract
ABSTRACTSome authors have suggested that mites in the family Laelapidae could be used as biological control agents of plant-feeding Scarabaeidae, by acting as predators or parasites of their larvae and pupae in soil. This paper proposes an alternative hypothesis, that these mites could actually be part of complex symbioses, and may sometimes be beneficial to the scarab larvae. The argument is based on some known examples of symbioses involving mites and insects, which involve multiple species at several different trophic levels. It is difficult or impossible to anticipate the effect of one species on another in these complex communities without including the many other species with which they interact. Careful study of these relationships will need detailed and accurate taxonomy, which has been lacking in some previous studies.
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