Mites associated with bark beetles and their hypophoretic Ophiostomatoid fungi: Expanding Frontiers

The role that mites play in many ecosystems is often overlooked or ignored. Within bark beetle habitats over 100 mite species are known to exist and they can have important impacts on community dynamics, ecosystem processes, and biodiversity of bark beetle systems. Mites use bark beetles to access and disperse among beetle-infested trees and the associations may range from mutualistic to antagonistic and from facultative to obligate. Many of these mites are mycetophagous, feeding on the Ophiostomatoid fungi that are found within beetle-infested trees and carried by bark beetles. Mycetophagous mites can affect the evolution and ecology of Ophiostomatoid fungi and thus, impact bark beetle-fungal associations and beetle population dynamics. In this chapter, we provide an overview of the known associations of bark beetles and mites and discuss how these associations may impact the interaction between beetles and fungi, and the evolution and ecology of Ophiostomatoid fungi.