Neoseiulus cucumeris (Oudemans)

ZahidiK, Abdelaziz, Akchour, Abdellah, K, Serge Kreiter, TixierK, Marie-Stéphane, MsandaK, Fouad & MousadikK, Abdelhamid El, 2023, Phytoseiid mites (Acari: Mesostigmata) from Central West Morocco: new records and key to females of all recorded Moroccan species, Acarologia 63 (3), pp. 691-724 : 695-696

Neoseiulus cucumeris (Oudemans)

Typhlodromus cucumeris Oudemans 1930: 69 .

Amblyseius cucumeris, Athias-Henriot 1957a 336.

Amblyseius (Typhlodromopsis) cucumeris, De Leon 1959 a .

Typhlodromus (Amblyseius) cucumeris, Chant 1959: 78 .

Amblyseius (Amblyseius) cucumeris, Wainstein 1962 .

Typhlodromus (Typhlodromus) cucumeris, Westerboer & Bernhard 1963 .

Amblyseius (Neoseiulus) cucumeris, De Leon 1965: 23 .

Neoseiulus cucumeris, Moraes et al. 1986: 76 , 2004a: 115 ; Chant & McMurtry 2003: 21, 2007: 25.

Neoseiulus thripsi ( McGill 1939) : 310 (Synonymy according to Chant 1959).

Neoseiulus bellinus ( Womersley 1954) : 177 (Synonymy according to Athias-Henriot 1960a).

World distribution — Algeria, Armenia, Australia, Austria, Azerbaijan, Azores, Belarus, Belgium, Canada, Canary Islands, Caucasus Region, Chile, Cyprus, Egypt, England, Finland, France, Georgia, Germany, Greece, Hungary, India, Iran, Israel, Italy, Latvia, Mexico, Moldova, Morocco, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Tunisia, Turkey, Ukraine, and USA.

Previous records from Morocco — This species has been reported in Morocco by McMurtry and Bounfour (1989). In addition, some females were collected on Juncus articulatus

L. ( Juncaceae ) at Larache, on Lavandula dentata L. ( Lamiaceae ) at Gorges of Zegzel ( Tixier et al. 2016).

Specimens examined — 3 ♀♀ collected at Taoufiqui 1 domain on citrus leaves in June 2018.

Remarks — Measurements and description of the adult females collected agree with those provided by Beard (1999) and Schicha (1976) for specimens from Australia. This species is commercialised and used in greenhouses to control phytophagous mites and thrips ( Messelink et al. 2006). It seems able to control Tetranychus urticae Kock and Phytonemus pallidus (Banks) in field-grown strawberry ( Fitzgerald et al. 2008). It was also known to feed on tarsonemid mites (Tuovinen and Lindquist 2010), eggs of Bemisia tabaci (Gennadius) on vegetables (cucumber, sweet pepper, tomato) in laboratory conditions as reported by Kim et al. (2008).