Chapter 4
Applied Ecology of Some Predacious Mites
in Iran
Hossein Madadi and Hashem Kamali
4.1 Introduction
Acarology – the study of mites and ticks- is a young field of science especially in
Iran. History review of predatory mite researches in Iran shows that most studies
have been done from the perspective of faunistic. Therefore, this chapter was
prepared from scientific resources available regarding the use of predatory mites as
biological control agents chiefly in greenhouses. Herbivorous mites mostly belong to
the
superorder
Acariformes,
order
Trombidiformes
and
suborder
Prostigmata (Lindquist et al. 2009b). The most important plant-feeding pest mites
are spider mites (family Tetranychidae), false spider mites (family Tenuipalpidae),
Acarid mites (family Acaridae), Tarsonemids (family Tarsonemidae) and eriophyid
mites (superfamily Eriophyoidea) that injure vegetables and ornamental plants
(Zhang 2003).
Two-spotted spider mite, (Tetranychus urticae Koch) (TSSM) is undoubtedly the
most invasive species in Iran and worldwide (Zhang 2003). This species has a wide
host range and more than 1200 species have been recorded to serve as host plants
(Zhang 2003), posing a major threat in Iran and cause yield reduction in all
agricultural and greenhouse products (Arbabi 2010). For many years, the primary
tactic for controlling herbivorous mites relies on synthetic chemical pesticides (Hoy
2011). Although especially after the Second World War, it has been confirmed that
this tactic did not work well and mites should be controlled using a rationale
framework named integrated pest management (IPM), employed multiple
H. Madadi (*)
Department of Plant Protection, Faculty of Agriculture, Bu-Ali Sina University, Hamedan, Iran
e-mail: hmadadi@basu.ac.ir
H. Kamali
Department of Plant Protection, Khorasan Razavi Agriculture and Natural Resources Research
and Education Center, Mashhad, Iran
© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021
J. Karimi, H. Madadi (eds.), Biological Control of Insect and Mite Pests in Iran,
Progress in Biological Control 18, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-63990-7_4
143
Applied Ecology of Some Predacious Mites
in Iran
Hossein Madadi and Hashem Kamali
4.1 Introduction
Acarology – the study of mites and ticks- is a young field of science especially in
Iran. History review of predatory mite researches in Iran shows that most studies
have been done from the perspective of faunistic. Therefore, this chapter was
prepared from scientific resources available regarding the use of predatory mites as
biological control agents chiefly in greenhouses. Herbivorous mites mostly belong to
the
superorder
Acariformes,
order
Trombidiformes
and
suborder
Prostigmata (Lindquist et al. 2009b). The most important plant-feeding pest mites
are spider mites (family Tetranychidae), false spider mites (family Tenuipalpidae),
Acarid mites (family Acaridae), Tarsonemids (family Tarsonemidae) and eriophyid
mites (superfamily Eriophyoidea) that injure vegetables and ornamental plants
(Zhang 2003).
Two-spotted spider mite, (Tetranychus urticae Koch) (TSSM) is undoubtedly the
most invasive species in Iran and worldwide (Zhang 2003). This species has a wide
host range and more than 1200 species have been recorded to serve as host plants
(Zhang 2003), posing a major threat in Iran and cause yield reduction in all
agricultural and greenhouse products (Arbabi 2010). For many years, the primary
tactic for controlling herbivorous mites relies on synthetic chemical pesticides (Hoy
2011). Although especially after the Second World War, it has been confirmed that
this tactic did not work well and mites should be controlled using a rationale
framework named integrated pest management (IPM), employed multiple
H. Madadi (*)
Department of Plant Protection, Faculty of Agriculture, Bu-Ali Sina University, Hamedan, Iran
e-mail: hmadadi@basu.ac.ir
H. Kamali
Department of Plant Protection, Khorasan Razavi Agriculture and Natural Resources Research
and Education Center, Mashhad, Iran
© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021
J. Karimi, H. Madadi (eds.), Biological Control of Insect and Mite Pests in Iran,
Progress in Biological Control 18, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-63990-7_4
143