Pachylaelaps Berlese

Masan, Peter, Oezbek, Hasan Hueseyin & Fenďa, Peter, 2016, Two new species of Pachylaelaps Berlese, 1888 from the Iberian Peninsula, with a key to European species (Acari, Gamasida, Pachylaelapidae), ZooKeys 603, pp. 71-95 : 73

Taxon classification Animalia Mesostigmata Pachylaelapidae

Genus Pachylaelaps Berlese

Pachylaelaps Berlese, 1888: 196. Type species Gamasus pectinifer G. Canestrini, 1881, by subsequent designation ( Berlese 1904).

Diagnosis.

Pachylaelaps can be reliably diagnosed by the following combination of characters: (1) dorsal shield oblong, suboval, and bearing 30 pairs of mostly subequal setae; (2) dorsocentral setae J2 in normal posterolateral position to setae J1; (3) sternal and genitoventral shield with four and two pairs of setae, respectively; (4) female tarsus II with two spur-like distal setae, pl1 and pl2; (5) sperm induction system of female associated with coxae IV; (6) tibial projections on male palp developed (except for species of Pachylaelaps pectinifer group); (7) genu I with 13 setae.

Taxonomic notes.

Mašán (2007) divided the genus into two subgenera, Pachylaelaps s. str. and Longipachylaelaps Mašán, 2007. That taxonomic concept is used also in this paper. The subgenus Longipachylaelaps is reliably distinguished from the subgenus Pachylaelaps s. str. mainly by the presence of normal needle-like dorsal setae J5, and only one pair of slit-like poroid structures (gdS4) placed on the posterolateral margin of the dorsal shield. In the subgenus Pachylaelaps s. str., setae J5 are vestigial, and the posterolateral dorsal shield margin bears two pairs of slit-like poroids, gdZ1 and gdS4.