Aturus gallicus K. Viets, 1939

Gerecke, Reinhard, 2014, Studies on European species of the water mite family Aturidae Thor (Acari: Hydrachnidia), Zootaxa 3841 (1), pp. 1-46 : 10

Aturus gallicus K. Viets, 1939

Fig. 6

Material examined. Type series: Holotype ♂, SMF 42872, " Aturus gallicus ♂ Viets Type Pyrenäen Gave d'Ossau Rieselwand 1.9.1937 Viets coll. 5767".

France: SMF 42829 "Alp. franc. Doméne 15.9.50 Vaillant coll. 7124" " Aturus asserculatus Walt. ♂"; SMF 42830, ditto "7125" "♀"; SMF 49794, ditto "4563" "♂, ♀". Italy: Sicily, I 532 (1/1/0).

Uncertain material. France: NHMB 4541 " Aturus gallicus ♂ Walter Marne 28.8.30. Coll. Angelier 1 XXIX/ 55; NHMB 4542 ditto "♀ XXIX /56" (both specimens undissected, completely dried).

Remarks. It happened certainly by chance that the above-named slides in SMF got the wrong species name label. By contrast, two slides from NHMB include a species different from A. gallicus— obviously, Walter planned to attribute the same name to another species which he never published. In his study on the water mites of river Marne, C. Angelier (1931) did not mention Aturus specimens collected at 28.8.1930. The bad state of the material does not allow species identification.

Males of this species are not confusable due to the characteristic "moustache"- shape of the dorsocentral transverse sclerotization. Females found together with male A. gallicus are characterized by the combination of 15–16 pairs of acetabula in the genital field, small idiosoma size (L <370), Dgl-4 far distanced from Dgl-5 (ratio Dgl-3–4/4–5 <1.5) and a rather slender P-4 (L/H ratio> 3.0).

Figures

FIGURE 6. Aturus gallicus, male. A. IV-L- 4 – 6 anterior; B. dorsum. Scale bars = 100 µm.