Phytoseius haroldi Ueckermann & Kreiter, 2002

Kreiter, Serge, Abo-Shnaf, Reham I. A. & Payet, Rose-My, 2020, Phytoseiid mites of Mayotte Island (Acari: Mesostigmata), Acarologia 60 (3), pp. 622-642 : 635

Phytoseius haroldi Ueckermann & Kreiter

Phytoseius haroldi Ueckermann & Kreiter in Kreiter et al. 2002: 339; Chant & McMurtry

2007: 129.

This species belongs to the horridus species group as setae J2 and R1 are absent ( Chant and McMurtry 1994). This species was described by Ueckermann and Kreiter in Kreiter et al. (2002) from La Réunion Island. It was abundant in low vegetation in a study of companion plants in citrus orchard in La Réunion Island ( Kreiter et al. 2020c). It seems that this species prefers low plants, but this observation has to be confirmed in further studies. The biology of this species remains also totally unknown. This species was recently reported in Mauritius ( Ferragut and Baumann 2019; Kreiter and Abo-Shnaf 2020b) and in Rodrigues Island ( Kreiter and Abo-Shnaf 2020a).

World distribution: La Réunion Island, Mauritius Island, Rodrigues Island.

Specimens examined: a single ♀ collected during this study. L’Abattoir, Dziani lake

(23 m aasl, 12°46 ′ 14 ″ S, 45°17 ′ 18 ″ E), 1 ♀ on Anacardium occidentale L. ( Anacardiaceae ), 27/XI/2018

Remarks: morphological and morphometric characters and all measurements of our specimens fit well with those of the original description in Kreiter et al. (2002) concerning specimens from La Réunion Island, Ferragut and Baumann (2019) for specimens from Mauritius, Kreiter et al. (2020c) for additional specimens from La Réunion Island and Kreiter and Abo-Shnaf (2020a) for specimens from Rodrigues Island.