Zetorchestes-Arten aus Neuguinea und Japan (Acari: Oribatida: Zetorchestidae)

A redescription of Zetorchestes saltator Oudemans, 1915 is given. In addition to that, two new Zetorchestes-species from New Guinea (Z. novaguineanus spec. nov., Z. vanderhammeni spec. nov.) and one new species from Japan (Z. aokii spec. nov.) are described in this paper. These four and some other similar species are compared in table 1. In the redescription and the descriptions attention is paid to the intraspecific morphological variability of body size, the shape of the anterior edge of the lamella, the position of the notogastric hair la, the number of the notogastric hairs, the number and position of the genital, anal and adanal hairs, and the shape of the edge of the lamella on femur II. It seems likely that the Zetorchestes-species from New Guinea prefer different ecological conditions. Zetorchestes saltator is the most widespread species. It lives in lowland swamp forests, in forests on limestone as well as in forests on serpentine and cristalline schists. Zetorchestes novaguineanus can mainly be found in soils of the forests on limestone. The occurrence of Z. vanderhammeni is limited to narrow beach forests growing on consolidated sand ridges. The taxonomic use of the subgenus Phyllorchestes Mahunka, 1983 is seen from a critical point of view.