Aturus

Male Aturus sp., from here.

Belongs within: Aturidae.

Aturus is a genus of water mites abundant in Eurasia and North America.

Characters (from Wolcott 1905): Body of the female inverted oval, of male with projecting anterior margin and weakly concave lateral margins, both sexes with a median cleft in the posterior margin, dorsal and ventral plates nearly equal in size; eyes of the two sides only moderately distant from each other; palpi with segment 2 having a long peg-like process at the distal margin of the flexor surface; epimera with only fused epimerae II and III of each side separate from the rest; legs short, without swimming-hairs; genital area at the posterior margin of the ventral chitinous plate, acetabula numerous, scattered along the posterior margin of the body almost to the place of articulation of leg IV and accompanied by a row of hairs, the opening guarded by two plates; the male marked also by the very strongly developed leg IV, of which segsments 4, 5 and 6 are variously modified, and by the possession in certain species of club-shaped hairs at the posterior end of the body on either side of the genital opening.

<==Aturus Kramer 1875 S86
    |--A. andinus Lundblad 1953 RFF05
    |--A. barbatulus Viets 1936 VBB91
    |--A. crinitus Thor 1902 VBB91
    |--A. hiatosomus Cook 1967 S86
    |--A. karamani Viets 1936 S86
    |--A. kronestedti Cook 1988 RFF05
    |--A. leligoensis van Rendburg 1971 S86
    |--A. liberorum Habeeb 1959 (n. d.) C91
    |--A. natagensis Protz 1900 VBB91
    |--A. paucisetus Motas & Tanasachi 1946 S86
    |--A. protzi Piersig 1901 GS91
    |--A. pulchellus Biesiadka 1975 S86
    |--A. scaber Kramer 1875 VBB91
    `--A. subterraneus Imamura 1957 S86

*Type species of generic name indicated

REFERENCES

[C91] Conroy, J. C. 1991. Acarology—a modern science. In Dusbábek, F. & V. Bukva (eds) Modern Acarology: Proceedings of the VIII International Congress of Acarology, held in České Budĕjovice, Czechoslovakia, 6–11 August 1990 vol. 1 pp. 5-16. SPB Academic Publishing: The Hague.

[GS91] Gerecke, R., & J. Schwoerbel. 1991. Water quality and water mites (Acari, Actinedida) in the Upper Danube region, 1959-1984. In: Dusbábek, F. & V. Bukva (eds) Modern Acarology: Proceedings of the VIII International Congress of Acarology, held in České Budĕjovice, Czechoslovakia, 6–11 August 1990 vol. 1 pp. 483-491. SPB Academic Publishing: The Hague.

[RFF05] Rosso de Ferradás, B. & H. R. Fernández. 2005. Elenco y biogeografía de los ácaros acuáticos (Acari, Parasitengona, Hydrachnidia) de Sudamérica. Graellsia 61 (2): 181-224.

[S86] Schwoerbel, J. 1986. Acari: “Hydrachnellae”. In Stygofauna Mundi: A Faunistic, Distributional, and Ecological Synthesis of the World Fauna inhabiting Subterranean Waters (including the Marine Interstitial) (L. Botosaneanu, ed.) pp. 652-696. E. J. Brill / Dr. W. Backhuys: Leiden.

[VBB91] Valdecasas, A. G., A. Baltanás & E. Bello. 1991. A preliminary assessment of single rocks for sampling water mites. In: Dusbábek, F. & V. Bukva (eds) Modern Acarology: Proceedings of the VIII International Congress of Acarology, held in České Budĕjovice, Czechoslovakia, 6–11 August 1990 vol. 1 pp. 503-507. SPB Academic Publishing: The Hague.

Wolcott, R. H. 1905. A review of the genera of the water-mites. Transactions of the American Microscopical Society 26: 161-243.