Neoseiulus lula (Pritchard & Baker)

Kreiter, Serge, Payet, Rose-My, Douin, Martial, Fontaine, Olivier, Jacques, Fillâtre & Bellec, Fabrice Le, 2020, Phytoseiidae of La Réunion Island (Acari: Mesostigmata): three new species and two males described, new synonymies, and new records, Acarologia 60 (1), pp. 111-195 : 127-128

Neoseiulus lula (Pritchard & Baker)

Amblyseius (Amblyseius) lula Pritchard & Baker, 1962: 239 .

Neoseiulus lula, Schicha 1981b: 212 ; Moraes et al. 1986: 87; Chant & McMurtry 2003a: 27; Moraes et al. 2004a: 130; Chant & McMurtry 2007: 29.

Amblyseius (Amblyseius) insignitus van der Merwe, 1968: 138 (synonymy according to Ueckermann & Loots, 1988).

Like N. baraki (see above), N. lula belongs to the paspalivorus species group ( Chant and McMurtry 2003a).

The biology of this species remains unknown.

It is distributed in several countries and islands of sub-Saharan Africa but also in Cuba ( Moraes et al. 2004a).

This is the first record of this species for La Réunion Island.

Specimens examined: a single ♀, measured. Saint-Pierre – Bassin-Plat CIRAD Research Station (aasl 153 m, Long 55°29’18” E, Lat 21°19’25” S), 1 ♀ on Chrysopogon zizanioides (L.), 2/3/2017.

Remarks: the measurements of the single female of Neoseiulus lula ( Table 7 ) fit well measurements of specimens of the original description from Central Africa ( Schicha 1981b) and those of specimens from Africa ( Zannou et al. 2006), except for j6 and S2 which are smaller (>20 %) in the single specimen of La Réunion. Specimens from Africa ( Zannou et al. 2006) have longer Z4 but a reduced ventrianal shield. Specimens from South Africa and Madagascar ( van der Merwe 1968; Ueckermann and Loots 1988) have in general greater dimensions than those obtained for specimens from La Réunion Island.