Pseudachorutinae, Borner C, 1906

Antipova, M. D. & Babenko, A. B., 2022, An annotated checklist of the springtails (Hexapoda: Collembola) recorded from the foothill and mountain parts of the Republic of North Ossetia-Alania, North Caucasus, Russia, Russian Entomological Journal 31 (4), pp. 331-345 : 336

Subfamily Pseudachorutinae

Micranurida forsslundi Gisin, 1949 . A European species, found in North Ossetia for the first time, but previously recorded from the northwestern Caucasus (Teberda) [ Kuznetsova et al., 2019; possibly also Dobrolyubova, 1984a, referred to as A. anophthalmica Stach, 1949 ]. It is possible that the obscure record of M. papillosa Axelson, 1902 by Kuchiev [2006] also belongs to this species. Based on our material, M. forsslundi is not abundant in the Tsey Gorge, but it occurs in a variety of habitats of the forest belt.

M. pygmaea Börner, 1901 . A cosmopolitan, usually not abundant in the nature reserve, where it was mainly encountered in forests with developed litter [ Kuznetsova et al., 2019].

M. sensillata (Gisin, 1953) . Probably a European species, ranging from the Canary Islands to Denmark [ Fjellberg, 1998]. In the nature reserve, it was first recorded from a pine forest near the village of Nar [ Kuznetsova et al., 2019, referred to as Anurida sp. ].

** Pseudachorutes vitalii Kaprus et Weiner, 2009 . The species was rather recently described from beech forests of Crimea. In the Tsey Gorge, it is abundant in the forest successional stages of the foreland, especially in a mixed forest with pine, birch and willow. We also found this species in the relevant material of N.A. Kuznetsova from the pine forests of the nature reserve. In that paper, it was referred to as P. dubius Krausbauer, 1898 [ Kuznetsova et al., 2019]. The latter species had also been recorded from the North Caucasus earlier [Stach, 1949; Dobrolyubova, 1984; Kuchiev, 2006]. However, taking into account the high degree of morphological similarity of these two species, at least some of these records can prove to belong to P. vitalii , not to P. dubius .