Morphology of Evimirus uropodinus (Berlese, 1903) Larva with Comments on Larval Characters in Evphididae (Parasitiformes: Mesostigmata)

Light microscopy and scanning electron microscopy were used to study and describe the larval stage of Evimirus uropodinus (Berlese, 1903) for the first time. It is also the first description of larvae at the genus level and the first report of E. uropodinus from Greece. In general, the larval morphology of Eviphididae Berlese is poorly known. We discussed the morphology of E. uropodinus larvae with data on all larval stages described so far in Eviphididae, i.e. Alliphis necrophilus (Christie, 1983), A. siculus (Oudemans, 1905), Eviphis cultratellus (Berlese, 1910), Pseudoalliphis sculpturatus (Karg, 1963), Thinoseius spinosus (Willmann, 1939) and Uroiphis greeni (Evans, 1980). The E. uropodinus larvae possess the characteristic posterodorsal sculptured pattern, a feature that was found so far only in larvae of E. cultratellus, and possess the simpliest cheliceral dentition of all known larvae of Eviphididae. The larval chelicera of E. uropodinus has no pilus dentilis and possesses specialized sensillae on the tip of a fixed digit, a set of characters that E. uropodinus larvae share with E. cultratellus and U. greeni. We found a 3-tined apotele in the described larva and discussed its presence in E. uropodinus.