Argas vespertilionis (Latreille, 1796)

Argas vespertilionis has a very wide distribution, typical of tick species specializing on bats as hosts. It occurs throughout Europe and much of Asia and Africa, ranging from the UK to Japan and reaching as far south as India (Filippova 1966; Hoogstraal 1985a). It occurs in breeding as well as transient colonies of bats in habitats including attics, burrows, tree holes and caves (Siuda et al. 2009). In continental Southeast Asia it has been recorded from Cambodia (Borel 1928) and possibly from Vietnam (Hornok et al. 2017). Hornok et al. (2017) show that most morphological characters are not significantly different between A. vespertilionis larvae from Europe and those from Vietnam. Nevertheless, larvae from these areas could be easily separated using two mitochondrial genetic markers, suggesting that A. vespertilionis may represent a species complex, with Chinese specimens belonging to the European group (Hornok et al. 2017).

Descriptions of all life history stages are available in Hoogstraal (1958). The male, female and larva are illustrated in Yamaguti et al. (1971).