Haemogamasus Berlese, 1889

Vinarski, Maxim V. & Korallo-Vinarskaya, Natalia P., 2017, An annotated catalogue of the gamasid mites associated with small mammals in Asiatic Russia. The family Haemogamasidae (Acari: Mesostigmata: Gamasina), Zootaxa 4273 (1), pp. 1-18 : 4

Genus Haemogamasus Berlese, 1889

Haemogamasus Berlese, 1889: 2 .

Dermanyssus Dugès, 1834: 18 , partim.

Hypoaspis G. Canestrini, 1884: 1569 , partim. Euhaemogamasus Ewing, 1933: 3 .

Groschaftella Přívora & Samšiňák, 1957: 270 . Terasterna Zhou, Gu & Wen, 1995: 172 , 175.

Type species: Haemogamasus hirsutus Berlese, 1889 .

General morphological diagnosis: see Kim et al. (1987), Mašán & Fend’a (2010: 71).

Remarks. The genus was established by Berlese (1889) to include the single species, Hg. hirsutus from the European mole ( Fig. 1 ). This species has not been found in Asiatic Russia although numerous recordings of Hg. hirsutus from the European part of the former USSR are known ( Nikulina, 2004). The most important taxonomic works on the genus are those by Vitzthum (1930), Bregetova (1949, 1956a), Keegan (1951), Evans & Till (1966), Allred (1969), Williams et al. (1978), Haitlinger (1988), and Lundquist (1990). The species of the genus were thought to inhabit all continents, except South America ( Bregetova, 1956a; Williams et al., 1978; Lundquist, 1990), but later records of Haemogamasus from Argentina and Chile have now been published ( Mosquera, 1988; Casanueva et al., 1994; Herrin & Sage, 2012). The genus includes about 60 species, 12 of which have been recorded in Europe (Mašán & Fend’a, 2010) and nearly 30 species in the former USSR ( Senotrusova , 1987; Goncharova et al., 1991). One of these species, Hg. pontiger (Berlese, 1904) , is of almost cosmopolitan distribution, being recorded from the Old World , the Americas , Antarctica and Australia ( Lundquist , 1990; Halliday , 2011). Ecologically , most species of Haemogamasus are parasites of small mammals and abundant in their hosts’ nests and shelters ( Balashov , 2009). In general, these mites are opportunistic parasites able to exploit a wide range of host species ( Bregetova , 1949); some of them were collected also from birds and birds’ nests ( Haitlinger , 1988; Gwaizdowicz et al., 2006). Strict host specificity in the genus is rarely observed ( Bregetova & Nel’zina , 1952). Some taxa ( Hg. pontiger ) are regarded as predators ( Halliday , 2011), and their relationships with Micromammalia are rather indirect. The role of different Haemogamasus species as vectors of viruses and other pathogenic microorganisms has been elucidated by many authors ( Zemskaya , 1973; Yakimenko et al., 2000; Valiente Moro et al., 2005; Žákovská et al., 2008; Mi’tkova et al., 2015).

Figures

FIGURE 1. Haemogamasus hirsutus, the type species of the genus Haemogamasus (after Berlese, 1889)