Dancing on the head of a pin: mites in the rainforest canopy

WA Museum Records and Supplements | Updated 9 years ago

Abstract - Mites, the most diverse taxon in the Arachnida, are a major component of the rainforest canopy fauna. Twenty-nine species of mites were identified from the outermost canopy (leaves and their subtending stems) of a single rose marara tree (Pseudoweinmannia lachnocarpa) growing in subtropical rainforest in south-eastern Queensland. None of these species were found in suspended soils collected from a treehole and the root mats of two epiphytic ferns on the same tree, although 21 other mite species lived in the soils. Forty-seven leaves and 290 cm of small stems from brown beech trees (Pennantia cunninghamii) at two subtropical rainforest sites 110 km apart contained 1615 mites representing 43 species. The average brown beech leaf contained three times as many species as the average rose marara leaf. Most mites collected from brown beech leaves were found within domatia, structures lacking on rose marara leaves. When domatia were blocked, average species number per leaf was reduced to half that on leaves with open domatia. Only four mite species were common to both sites, and only five species were found on both rose marara and brown beech, suggesting that a very diverse fauna awaits discovery.