Mansour, F.
Bernstein, E.
Abo-Moch, F., Dept. of Entomology, ARO, Newe Ya'ar Research Center, Haifa, 31900, Israel

Four spider species and the predacious mite Phytoseiulus persimilis (Athias-Henriot) were examined in the laboratory for their capacity to feed on the carmine spider mite, Tetranychus cinnabarinus (Boisduval). The adult females of Chiracanthium mildei L. Koch showed the highest capacity for feeding on T. cinnabarinus (27.5 mites/day) and differed significantly from all other spider species, including the immature C. mildei which consumed an average of 18.9 mites/day - nearly equal to that of the Oxyopidae species (16.8 mites/day). The salticid (10.1 mites/day) and theridiid (9.5 mites/day) spider species had the lowest capacity, which was nearly equal to that of the predacious mite P. persimilis (11.3 mites/day). Results indicate that spiders play an important role as mite predators. © 1995 Springer Science + Business Media B.V.