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The Influence of Temperature on the Development Time of Three Oribatid Mite Species (Acari, Oribatida) |

Dinesh Kumar Chaturvedi, in Journal of Advances in Science and Technology | Science & Technology

ABSTRACT:

Oribatid mites are one of the arthropod groups with classicaldevelopment cycle.   They   go  through   six   morphological   stages,  each   separated by   a  moult.   The development time oforibatids is generally slow. Moreover, it has been documented that temperature,soil acidity, humidity, amount and quality of food and disturbance affect thelife cycle (Luxton 1975, Maraun & Scheu 2000). Furthermore, it is assumedthat the generation time depends mostly on the genetic mode. All variations indevelopment time caused by the environment (temperature or quality of food) aresmaller than variations within families or order, which are based on stronggenetic basis (Siepel 1994). The aim of this paper is to study the development timeof two Ceratoppia (Ceratoppidae)and one Nanhermannia   (Nanhermanniidae) species. Obtaineddata allow comparisons between the development time of two sexual species: Ceratoppia bipilis (Hermann, 1804)and C.  quadridentata  (Haller,  1882) and  one  parthenogenetic  species Nanhermannia  cf. coronata Berlese, 1913with the earlier studied N. Nana (Nicolet, 1855). Recent studies indicated that in laboratory theduration of egg and nymphal stages of C.bipilis was shorter than in C. quadridentata, while durations of moults were approximatelyidentical. The development of Ceratoppiabipilis from egg to adult lasted 43-65 days, whereas that of C. quadridentata –57-89  days. The development of Nanhermannia cf.  coronatawas similar to earlier examined  N.  nana and lasted  112-149 days.  At 20 ºС the life cycle of Ceratoppia was much shorter than thatof N. cf. coronata. Our findings indicate thatmites from the Brachypylina group generally develop much faster than those ofearly-derivative mites. However, this fact contradicts earlier suggestions,that the generation time of parthenogens is shorter than that of sexualspecies.