A preliminary report with new records of feather mites (Acariformes: Astigmata) collected from birds ringed at Boğazkent Bird Ringing Station (Antalya, Türkiye)

Abstract

Feather mites (Astigmata: Analgoidea, Pterolichoidea) are arthropods that live parasitically or commensal on the wing, tail and body feathers of birds. These mites have high host specificity and diversity. Here we studied feather mites collected from birds subjected to ectoparasitic examination during ringing at the Boğazkent Bird Ringing Station (Antalya, Türkiye). Feather mite infestation was detected in 50 of 103 hosts representing 30 species during the study. As a result of microscopic examinations, 16 feather mites were identified, five of which are new records for Türkiye: Dermonoton parallelus (Mégnin and Trouessart, 1884), Gymnolichus secundus Černý and Schumilo, 1973, Proctophyllodes anthi (Vitzthum, 1922), Pteronyssus robini (Faccini and Atyeo, 1981), and Pteroherpus africanus Mironov and Kopij, 2000. Additionally, new host-parasite associations for the feather mite fauna of Türkiye were revealed in the species Dolichodectes edwardsi (Trouessart, 1885), P. clavatus Fritsch, 1961, P. pinnatus (Nitzsch, 1818), and Trouessartia kratochvili Černý, 1979.

Keywords

• Acarofauna
• avian parasite
• bird parasite
• first record
• host-parasite association

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