Amblyomma multipunctum Neumann, 1899

Guglielmone, Alberto A., Nava, Santiago & Robbins, Richard G., 2023, Geographic distribution of the hard ticks (Acari: Ixodida: Ixodidae) of the world by countries and territories, Zootaxa 5251 (1), pp. 1-274 : 54-55

79. Amblyomma multipunctum Neumann, 1899 .

Neotropical: 1) Colombia, 2) Ecuador, 3) Venezuela ( Neumann 1911 a , Labruna et al. 2013, Guglielmone et al. 2021).

Problems may be encountered when attempting to correctly identify Amblyomma multipunctum . According to Labruna et al. (2013), the description of the male in Boero & Prosen (1959) actually refers to Ambyomma scalpturatum . Moreover, the key of Jones et al. (1972) for the species of Amblyomma in the Western Hemisphere is not useful when attempting to identify Amblyomma multipunctum , and there are differences among the authors who have redescribed this tick ( Guglielmone et al. 2020, 2021). Therefore, data concerning Amblyomma multipunctum should be regarded with scepticism.

Neumann (1899) described Amblyomma multipunctum from two male ticks allegedly collected in North America, one from Antilocapra americana (named as Dicranocerus furcatus ), a Nearctic artiodactyl, and the other from a species of Tapirus . Neumann (1911a) added Venezuela to the geographic distribution of Amblyomma multipunctum but, strangely, did not alter the number of specimens discussed in Neumann (1899) .

All bona fide records of this tick published after Neumann (1911a) are from Tapirus pinchaque, and the record from Antilocapra in the Nearctic Region has not been confirmed; consequently, Guglielmone et al. (2014, 2021) excluded this region from the range of Amblyomma multipunctum . Vargas (1955) included Mexico within the geographic distribution of Amblyommma multipunctum , but Guzmán-Cornejo et al. (2011) state that there are neither host records nor locality data confirming this species’ presence in Mexico. There is a Bolivian record of Amblyomma multipunctum in Boero & Prosen (1959) but, as noted above, it is treated as a misidentification in Labruna et al. (2013). Teixeira et al. (2013) listed “armadillos” as hosts of unknown stages of Amblyomma multipunctum in Brazil, but Dantas-Torres et al. (2019) exclude this tick from the list of Brazilian Amblyomma . Accordingly, we do not include Mexico, Bolivia and Brazil within the geographic distribution of Amblyomma multipunctum .