#allothrombium — Public Fediverse posts

#MiteMonday: your regular dose of sumo mite shenanigans.

I think the larger one may be a female? The aggressive mites don't try to fight it.

#DailyMiteVid #Mitestodon #arachnids #mites #Acari #Trombidiidae #Allothrombium

#MiteMonday: a red velvet mite, knocked over and playing dead, slowly uncurls. I just think this is too cute.

Marked sensitive because the video is kind of shaky at the start, in case anyone else is prone to vertigo with shaky videos like me.

#DailyMiteVid #Mitestodon #arachnids #mites #Acari #Trombidiidae #Allothrombium

it's over anakin, i have the high ground

#DailyMiteVid #Mitestodon #arachnids #mites #Acari #Trombidiidae #Allothrombium #MiteBehaviour

Saturday night's all right for (sumo mite) fighting

edit: you can also see much smaller clover mites (_Bryobia_) moving around in the periphery. They are the bluish ones with threadlike pink-orange legs. That is their full size. For comparison, the sumo mites are like 4mm tops?

#DailyMiteVid #Mitestodon #arachnids #mites #Acari #Trombidiidae #Allothrombium #MiteBehaviour

That Lady and the Tramp scene with the spaghetti, but it's these sumo mites (_Allothrombium_) feeding on a dead midge (family Chironomidae).

Also later they started fighting, but I'm not sure if they were fighting over the midge or just regular sumo mite fighting.

#DailyMiteVid #Mitestodon #arachnids #mites #Acari #Trombidiidae #Allothrombium #MiteBehaviour

Got a lot of fighting sumo mite (_Allothrombium_) video/pics today!

In this pic you can see how the mites' pedipalps have little claws or thumbs on the end. Arachnid pedipalps are (of course) modified legs, the same appendages as scorpion and pseudoscorpion pincers, amblypygids' thorny elbowed claws, etc. In female spiders they are kind of like "hands", simple short feelers/holders, but in mature male spiders the various parts that would have been leg bits are repurposed to become highly elaborate sperm transfer organs. APPENDAGES!

#DailyMitePic #Mitestodon #arachnids #mites #Acari #Trombidiidae #Allothrombium #macro

This #MiteMonday, come face-to-face with a sumo mite (_Allothrombium_). That gaze may seem piercing, but from their behaviour they seem to be quite blind.

#DailyMitePic #Mitestodon #arachnids #mites #Acari #Trombidiidae #Allothrombium #macro

#MiteMonday: Went to visit the Sumo Mite Tree today as it was slightly warmer than yesterday. There were plenty of mites, but unfortunately they were not really in a fightin' mood, at least not before I got cold (I underdressed) and had to go back. I did capture this great flip takedown though.

#DailyMitePic #Mitestodon #arachnids #mites #Acari #Trombidiidae #Allothrombium

the perils of being a sumo mite

#DailyMiteVid #Mitestodon #arachnids #mites #Trombidiidae #Allothrombium #sumo #macro

This one red velvet mite was very interested in a small insect pupa of some kind. https://youtu.be/TxRUAw3pqkA

#DailyMitePic #DailyMiteVid #Mitestodon #mites #Acari #Trombidiidae #Allothrombium #RedVelvetMites #macro

Enjoy 1:45 of red velvet mites (Trombidiidae) bumbling around in the leaf litter while a band jams in the background and _Lasius_(?) ants industriously excavate.

https://youtu.be/x1Y6JqGuoBQ

#DailyMitePic #DailyMiteVid #Mitestodon #mites #Acari #Trombidiidae #Allothrombium #RedVelvetMites #macro