Typhlodromalus spinosus

Kreiter, Serge, Payet, Rose-My & Azali, Hamza Abdou, 2021, Phytoseiid mites (Acari: Mesostigmata) of Anjouan Island (Comoros Archipelago), Acarologia 61 (1), pp. 62-83 : 71-72

Typhlodromalus spinosus (Meyer & Rodrigues)

Amblyseius spinosus Meyer & Rodrigues 1966: 30 ; Moraes et al. 1986: 31.

Kampimodromus spinosus, Quilici et al. 2000: 100 .

Typhlodromalus spinosus, Moraes et al. 2004b: 204 ; Chant & McMurtry 2005a: 199, 2007:

111.

This species belongs to the athiasae species group as setae J1 and S5 are absent. This species group contains six species ( Chant and McMurtry 2005a, Moraes et al. 2006).

Typhlodromalus spinosus was collected from Eastern, Western, but mainly Southern Africa and La Réunion ( Demite et al. 2020). The rapid multiplication of this species on the western flower thrips (WFT), Frankliniella occidentalis Pergande , was confirmed and clear evidence that T. spinosus predates on WFT under laboratory and field conditions, but not T on. urticae ( Mwangi et al. 2015) . It seems to be abundant in low vegetation as it was found in high populations in a study of companion plants in citrus orchard (Le Bellec et al. unpub. data).

This species have never been recorded from Guadeloupe or Martinique in similar studies, but it is interesting to notice that in those islands, another Typhlodromalus was collected, T. peregrinus (Muma) ( Mailloux et al. 2010 ; Kreiter et al. 2013, 2018c). Typhlodromalus spinosus was recorded from La Réunion by Quilici et al. (2000) and was then find in quite high numbers by Kreiter et al. (2020d) and in few numbers from Mauritius Island ( Kreiter and Abo­Shnaf 2020b).

World distribution: Benin, Burundi Dr Congo, Kenya, Malawi, Mozambique, La Réunion Island.

Specimens examined: a single ♀ specimen collected during this study. Dindi, inside the village (567 m aasl, 12°12 ′ 56 ″ S, 44°27 ′ 02 ″ E), 2 ♀♀ on Lantana camara L. ( Verbenaceae ), 29/XI/2018.

Remarks: this species was described from Mozambique ( Meyer and Rodrigues 1966), then mentioned in the Indian Ocean from la Réunion ( Quilici et al. 2000 ; Kreiter et al. 2020d) and Mauritius ( Kreiter and Abo­Shnaf 2020b). Morphological and morphometric characters of our specimens fit well those provided by Kreiter et al. (2020d).