Family CROTONIIDAE Thorell, 1876

Museums

Regional Maps

• Crotonides Thorell, T. 1876. Sopra alcuni Opilioni (Phalangidea) d'Europa e dell'Asia occidentale, con un quadro dei generi europei di quest'Ordine. Annali del Museo Civico di Storia Naturale, Genova 8: 452-508.
• Camisiinae Oudemans, A.C. 1900. Remarks on the denomination of the genera and higher groups in 'Das Tierreich, Oribatidae'. Tijdschrift voor Entomologie 43: 140-149.

Introduction

The family Crotoniidae, including genera previously placed in the Camisiidae, includes ten genera and 164 species world-wide (Schatz et al. 2011). The family is cosmopolitan, and includes many species that are abundant in forest litter, as well as large numbers species that are arboreal, or are found in mosses, lichens, and peat bogs (Norton & Behan-Pelletier 2099). Many species carry a large mass of adhering debris and fragments of the cuticle of previous instars, which obscures their appearance. The family is represented in Australia by five genera and 39 species, mostly in the genus Crotonia, as recently revised by Colloff (2009, 2010). Unidentified species of Crotoniidae were reported from Australia by Springett (1979), Palmer & Norton (1991), Osler (1997), Colloff & Halliday (1998) and Proctor et al. (2002). Those species and others have since been described in a series of papers, as listed in the checklist.

Łochyńska (2008) reported the South African species Crotonia dicella Colloff, 1990 from Australia. However, this was a misidentification, and the Australian specimens reported by Łochyńska have now been described as Crotonia tasmaniana Colloff, 2009.

Excluded Taxa

Misidentifications

CROTONIIDAE: Crotonia dicella Colloff, 1990 — Colloff, M.J. 1990. New species of Crotonia (Acari: Oribatida) from South Africa. Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society 100: 403–419

General References

Colloff, M.J. 2009. New species of Crotonia (Acari: Oribatida) from Tasmania rainforest, and the habitat preferences of Crotoniidae. Zootaxa 2027: 43–54

Colloff, M.J. 2010. The Gondwanan relict oribatid genus Crotonia (Acari: Oribatida: Crotoniidae) from rainforests in Queensland and northern New South Wales: new species show a mixed pattern of short-range and long-range endemism. Zootaxa 2649: 1–51

Colloff, M.J. & Halliday, R.B. 1998. Oribatid Mites: A Catalogue of the Australian Genera and Species. Melbourne : CSIRO Publications.

Norton, R.A. & Behan-Pelletier, V.M. 2009. Suborder Oribatida. pp. 430–564 in Krantz, G.W. & Walter, D.E. (eds). A Manual of Acarology. Lubbock, Texas : Texas Tech University Press Third edition, 807 pp.

Osler, G.H.R. 1997. Factors Contributing to the Structure of Soil Mite Communities. PhD thesis, Department of Biological Sciences, Macquarie University. 212 pp.

Palmer, S.C. & Norton, R.A. 1991. Taxonomic, geographic and seasonal distribution of thelytokous parthenogenesis in the Desmonomata (Acari : Oribatida). Experimental and Applied Acarology 12: 67-81

Proctor, H.C., Montgomery, K.M., Rosen, K.E. & Kitching, R.L. 2002. Are tree trunks habitats or highways? A comparison of oribatid mite assemblages from hoop-pine bark and litter. Australian Journal of Entomology 41: 294–299

Schatz, H., Behan-Pelletier, V.M., OConnor, B.M. & Norton, R.A. 2011. Suborder Oribatida van der Hammen, 1968. pp. 141–148 in Zhang, Z.-Q. Animal Biodiversity: An Outline of Higher-level Classification and Survey of Taxonomic Richness. Auckland : Magnolia Press.

Springett, J.A. 1979. The effects of a single hot summer fire on soil fauna and on litter decomposition in jarrah (Eucalyptus marginata) forest in Western Australia. Australian Journal of Ecology 4: 279-291

Łochyńska, M. 2008. The ontogenetic description of two Tasmanian crotoniid mites (Acari: Oribatida: Crotoniidae). International Journal of Acarology 34: 123–142

History of changes