Hemileius scrobina Berlese, 1916

Schatz, Heinrich, Fortini, Lorenzo, Fusco, Tommaso, Casale, Francesca, Jacomini, Carlo & Giulio, Andrea Di, 2021, Oribatid mites (Acari, Oribatida) from “ Parco Naturale delle Alpi Marittime ” (Piedmont, Italy), Zootaxa 5082 (6), pp. 501-540 : 529

Hemileius scrobina Berlese, 1916

Oribatula (Hemileius) scrobina Berlese 1916, p. 323 .

Hemileius scrobina Mahunka 1994a, p. 43 , figs 20, 21.

Parco Naturale delle Alpi Marittime: AB, FRA, FAG, PAL sparse.

General distribution: Northern, southern? Italy; Italian Alps (Bergamo type locality); possible distribution in Monte Pollino Massif , Basilicata, Calabria ( Hemileius cf. scrobina, Bernini et al. 1987 ) .

Habitat preferences: unknown, found in moss (type locality, Berlese 1916, Hemileius cf. scrobina, Monte Pollino, Bernini et al. 1987 ); silvicolous (Alpi Marittime).

Remarks: Body length 490–570 µm. Notogaster pustulate, notogastral setae thin, short (~20–25 µm), difficult to detect (“ Pili in dorso et ad margines notogastri nulli, certe etiam maximarum amplificationum ope non conspicui ” Berlese 1916), Mahunka (1994a) drew short, well visible notogastral setae (“ Ten pairs of equally long, fine notogastral setae and four pairs of small sacculi present”). Apart from size, the studied specimens from the Maritime Alps lack morphological differences to the species descriptions ( Berlese 1916, Mahunka 1994a) and are considered to be conspecific. A minor difference is the body size. Berlese (1916) indicated a body size of 480 x 320 µm. Most specimens from the Maritime Alps are larger [length of males (n=5) 470–520 µm, females (n=8) 520–570 µm]; apparently Berlese studied a smaller male. Subías (2004) listed the species as Hemileius (Tuberemaeus) scrobinus without further discussion. He apparently based this hypothesis on the similar shape of the body surface of Tuberemaerus singularis Sellnick, 1930 . But the surface of the latter species has foveolae, whereas the notogaster of H. scrobina is pustulate. Moreover, the generic diagnosis of Tuberemaeus Sellnick, 1930 stresses the presence of two humps on the posterior notogaster ( Sellnick 1930) which are not present in H. scrobina (Mahunka 1994) . Therefore, we reject this assignment.