Soil mites (Acari) of natural areas of a former military training field in Olsztyn (Poland)

Due to restricted public access to military training fields such areas are quite interesting places for conducting faunistic research that would be simply impossible in other terrains. The area examined in the present study was the former military training field in Olsztyn, with the adjacent Lasek Pieczewski and the valley of Skanda Lake. The major aim of the study was to evaluate the current state of the environment in the terrain of the former military training field and the adjacent areas. In this study mites from the suborder Uropodina and cohort Labidostommatina (Acari: Mesostigmata et Prostigmata) were used as a bioindicators. These mites are useful for this purpose because of their specific habitat preferences. The community of mites in the area under scrutiny contained 23 taxa, comparing to 34 species found in whole voivoideship, which is 68% of local species biodiversity. Oodinychus ovalis turned out to be the most numerous species (the specimens of this species constituted almost 38% of the whole community and the frequency per sample was 55%). The other quite numerous species found in the examined area were Janetiella pulchella and Oodinychus karawaiewi, which constituted over 30% of the whole community. Taking into account the number of species and their habitat preferences two most valuable areas were found: southern part of Lasek Pieczewski and Skanda Lake valley.