THE MORE IMPORTANT FAMILIES OF ACAIU. 



115 



Mites (fio-. 1-1), are generally slowly moving, but occasionally quick-running, 

 predaceous creatures, usually of a red colour, and feeding on all kinds of soft- 

 bodied Mites, which are to be found on plants and under the bark of trees. 



(/>) Prostigmata Parasitengona are so called because the larvse are 

 parasites, whereas the nymphs and adults are predaceous. Their very 

 interesting, red-coloured larv?e are often to be found infesting gnats, water- 

 bugs, water-beetles, all kinds of land-beetles, bugs, grasshoppers, spiders, 

 frogs, birds, bats, and small mammals. Tn many instances they have no 

 economic significance, but as in some cases they cause the death of mosquitoes 

 and other noxious insects, they must to that extent be considered beneficial. 



A figure is given here of one of the grasshopper-parasites (fig. 15). Tn hot 



Fig-. 15. — Euthromhidium trigonum, Herni, ; 

 larva; dorsal side. — Copied from Berlese, 

 Ordo Prostigmata, tab. 13, 1893, a little 

 altered. — Useful. 



Fig. 16. — Hydryphantes ruber, de 

 Geer; larva; dorsal side. — 

 Copied from Oudemans, in Tijds. 

 Ent. v. 46, tab. 1 ; 1904. — 

 Useful. 



summers, especially during tlie harvest time, they may abound^ and in this 

 instance they may be exceedingly troublesome to man. Thus in the Guianas 

 the "batata-mite," in Mexico the " tlalzahuatl,'' in France the " rouget,^^ in 

 England the ^'harvest-mite/' in ^ew Guinea and Celebes the " gonone," are 

 well known plagues. They burrow into the skin and cause intolerable itching 

 and painful little blisters. To this section belong the slowly moving, 

 generally scarlet and velvety, Harvest Mites (Thrombidiid^), which live 

 free, preying on smaller weak creatures, gnats and files, and living on the 

 ground, on trees, or on her])s ; it includes also the well known, generally 

 globular, red or green Water Mites (Hydrarachnid.e) ; and finally the 

 quickly running, red or ])rown coloured Tufted Snout Mites (Erythr^eidJ!:). 



