A TREATISE ON THE ACARINA, OR MITES. 



By Nathan Banks, 



Custodian of Aradnvda. 



PREFACE. 



The mites have alwa\'.s attracted consideral)le interest, both from 

 their minute size and because of the remarkable habits of man}^ spe- 

 cies. Ahhough many have examined them in a desultor}^ way, Init 

 few have really studied them. Consequently there is a great amount 

 of literature by many persons, much of which is not reliable. Too 

 often entomologists have considered that their knowledge of insects 

 in general was a sufficient l^asis for the description of mites. Prob- 

 ably the lack of general works on mites has been responsible for many 

 errors. For years the only work treating of the mites as a whole 

 that has been accessible to American naturalists is Andrew Murray's 

 Economic Entomology; Aptera. In this ))ook, nearly 3()0 pages are 

 devoted to Acarina. Unfortunately Murray's treatment is far from 

 satisfactory and abundantly stored with mistakes, many, however, 

 taken from other writers. 



Since that book was published several European specialists have 

 been at work on the European fauna and produced monographs which 

 are of great accuracv. Not only have many new facts been discovered, 

 ■l)ut many of the old facts have ])een given quite new interpretations. 

 Such a belief as the parasitism of the Uropoda on the Colorado potato- 

 beetle seems hardly as yet to have been eradicated. To present a reli- 

 able text to the Aujerican reader is my intention. Very frequently I 

 have obtained many facts of importance and interest from the European 

 literature; particularly is this true with those parasitic groups with 

 which 1 am not so well acquainted. Errors will, of course, be found, 

 but great care has been exercised in choosing the sources of information. 



I have given tables to all the known American genera, and in some 

 families added other well-known genera which will doubtless occur in 

 our fauna when it is more thoroughlv explored. 



Practically the only door through which one may enter into the 

 S3^stematic study of mites in general is Canestrini's Prospetto dell'Aca- 

 rofauna Italiana. 



Proceedings U. S. National Museum, Vol. XXVIII— No. 1382. 

 Proc. N. :\1. vol. xxviii— 04 1 - 1 



