NOTES ON THE ECOLOGY OF SOIL MITES (ACARI) IN TWO CONTRASTING SITES OF SCHIRMACHER OASIS, EAST ANTARCTICA

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Acknowledgments:

The author is grateful to Dr. J.R.B. Alfred, Director, Zoological Survey of India, for his con-stant inspiration for studying the soil mites of Antarctica and providing all necessary help for the study. The author expresses sincere thanks to scien-tists and technical staff of the same Institute, Dr. A.K. Hazra, Scientist-"E", for encouragement, help and suggestions to improve the manuscript, Dr. S.K. Gupta, Emeritus Scientist, for identification of some mite specimens, and to Mr. Shri Anand Kumar Ayyaswamy, Mr. Shri Amitava Roy and Dr. Sandeep K. Tiwari for computation of data. The author is also thankful to Dr. S.C. Santra, Depart-ment of Environment, the University of Kalyani, for the chemical analysis of the soil samples.

The author is grateful to the Ministry of Envi-ronment and Forests, and to the Department of Ocean Development, the Government of India, for providing an opportunity to participate in the XIX Indian Scientific Expedition to Antarctica.

Annotation:

Soil mite communities of two contrasting sites in the Schirmacher Oasis, Dronning Moud Land, East Antarctica, were compared. Five taxaof mites, Nanorchestes sp., Tyrophagus longior, Acaridae gen. sp., Suidasici nesbitti and Hypoaspis sp., were recorded. In most cases a positive correlation was found between soil mite communities and soil factors such as the temperature, relative humidity, organic carbon, nitrate, potassium and pH.

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