ZOOLOGY AND BOTANY, MICKOSCOPY, ETC. 365 



8. Arachnida. 



Acarina of Clare Island.* — J. N. Halbert deals with terrestrial and 

 marine mites found during the survey of Clare Island and the sur- 

 rounding district. He has already reported on eighty fresh-water mites, 

 and he now adds 186 to the list of Clare Island Acarina, making a total 

 of 266 species. It has been found necessary to define three new Gamasid 

 genera. Descriptions and figures are given of twenty-two new species 

 and five new varieties. Apart also from the extension in the known 

 range of many species, at least ninety are recorded for Britain for the 

 first time (this being in part due to the scarcity of British records for 

 Gamasoidea and Tromboidea), and at least 156 species were previously 

 unrecorded for Ireland. 



The author points out that the Gamasoid group is in need of a 

 general revision. Many of the most interesting Acarina found during 

 the Clare Island Survey belong to this group. They are small and 

 medium-sized mites, of very varied habits and structure. The free- 

 living forms occur among moss, in fungi, under bark of decaying 

 trees, etc. ; some are found only in ants' nests ; others must be sought 

 for between tide-marks on the shore ; others, again, are parasitic. 



Of the Oribatoidea, sixty species were collected, and it is interesting 

 to note that only two of these (and a few varieties) are not dealt with 

 in Michael's admirable monograph. The occurrence of the marine 

 Tyroglyphid, Hyadesia fusca, is interesting, and also the presence of 

 TyroyJyphus wasmanai in the nests of the Black Ant. Some minute 

 marine Halacaridre were collected. A number of littoral forms were 

 found, notably a peculiarly isolated form, Thinozercon michaeli, which 

 seems to require a new family of Gamasoidea, and the new genus 

 Haluropoda, from the shore and salt marshes. Many forms were got 

 below high-tide mark, undergoing continual immersion. An undoubted 

 Sphagnum fauna occurs in very wet places. 



*• Crustacea. 



Reptant Decapoda of Irish Coasts. f—C. M. Selbie reports on the 

 Palinura, Astacura, and Anomura (except Paguridea) of the coasts of 

 Ireland. The collection includes thirty-one species, four of which are 

 new to science, eleven new to the British, and sixteen to the Irish 

 murine fauna. The feature of the collection is the large number of 

 specimens belonging to the family Eryonida?, of which no examples had 

 previously been taken within the British marine area. Four species of 

 Polycheles and four of Eryonkus were taken, three of the latter — 

 E. hibernicus, E. scharffi, and E. kempi — being new. " Perhaps the 

 most interesting specimen in the whole collection is a very young 

 Eryonkus, only 7 mm. long, in which only the first two pairs of pereio- 

 pods are developed, the rostrum has the form of a long median spine, 

 and the abdomen is very small. The most striking fact, however, is 



» Proc. Roy. Irish Acad., xsxi. (1915) Clare Island Survey, pt. 39, ii. pp. 45-136 

 (5 pis.). 



t Sci. Invest. Fisheries Ireland, 1914, No. 1, pp. 1-116 (15 pis.). 



