Amblyseius parasundi Blommers, 1974

Kreiter, Serge, Payet, Rose-My, Mouigni, Hadji, Douin, Martial, Tixier, Marie-Stéphane & Azali, Hamza Abdou, 2021, New records of phytoseiid mites (Acari: Mesostigmata) of Grande Comore Island (Comoros Archipelago), Acarologia 61 (2), pp. 241-273 : 253

Amblyseius parasundi Blommers

Amblyseius (Proprioseiopsis) parasundi Blommers 1974: 144 .

Amblyseius parasundi, Moraes et al. 1986: 27, 2004b: 46 .

Amblyseius (Amblyseius) parasundi , Denmark & Muma 1989: 19.

This species has no setae Z1 and consequently belongs to the sundi species group and by having the spermatheca elongate, tub­like, to the sundi species subgroup. Although it was mentioned as abundant on fruit trees in Madagascar preying on tetranychid mites ( Blommers and Gutierrez 1975), its biology is still not known.

World distribution: Madagascar Island, Mayotte Island.

Specimens examined: seven specimens (4 ♀♀ and 3 imm.) collected during this study. Mvouni, University of Comoros (434 m aasl, lat. 11°43 ′ 11 ″ S, long. 43°16 ′ 31 ″ E), 1

♀ on Litchi sinensis Sonnerat (Sapindaceae) and 1 ♀ and 2 imm. on Clidemia hirta L. ( Melastomataceae ), 6/XII/2018 ; Ivembeni, Banda Samlini (791 m aasl, lat. 11°29 ′ 22 ″ S, long. 43°19 ′ 36 ″ E), 1 ♀ on Mangifera indica L. ( Anacardiaceae ), 7/XII/2018 ; Djoumoichongo (230

m aasl, lat. 11°48 ′ 34 ″ S, long. 43°17 ′ 37 ″ E), 1 ♀ on Psidium guajava L. ( Myrtaceae ) and 1

imm. on Cyathea sp. (Chyteaceae) , 10/XII/2018.

Remarks: morphological and morphometric characters and all measurements fit quite well with few measurement values from the literature ( Blommers 1974, Denmark and Muma 1989)

and from specimens from Mayotte Island (Kreiter et al. 2020a). Amblyseius parasundi is reported by Blommers (1974) as being a thelytokous species in mass­rearing and field collected specimens and this information is also mentioned in Denmark and Muma (1989). Actually, no males were collected in Grande Comore but 4 males were collected in Mayotte Island (Kreiter et al. 2020a) and will be described in a following paper.