Fauna and species diversity of sucking lice in Yunnan
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Key Words：sucking lice, species diversity, fauna, host animals, Yunnan
Abstract：Sucking lice are exclusively hematophagous ectoparasites of eutherian (placental) mammals and widely distribute in the world. Up to now, 44 louse species of 13 genera of 9 families in Anoplura have been described in Yunnan Province, accounting for 81.82%, 5909% and 4583% of known species, genera and families in China. Based on reported literature, we studied the species diversity of sucking lice through the analysis of taxon category, endemic species, zoogeography and host animals in Yunnan Province. There are 13 endemic species in Yunnan. Yunnan's sucking louse species mainly consist of Oriental components with 27species. The species diversity of sucking lice shows relatively high in the Median of Hengduan Mountains Microregion and the South of Hengduan Mountains Microregionin comparison with the rest three ones in Yunnan's five zoogeographical microregions. The species diversity of sucking lice is abundant in Yunnan in comparison with other provinces of China. In comparison with fleas, chiggers and gamasid mites, the species diversity of sucking lice on mammals is much lower than that of other ectoparasites. Each family (or genus) of sucking lice has its corresponding host animals and tends to parasitize on the specific family (or genus) of host animals. The results indicate the fact that sucking lice often have a high hostspecificity. A stable parasitism relationship has been established between the sucking lice and their corresponding hosts in the long history of mutual evolution and this is a reliable ecological evidence for the coevolution between sucking lice and their mammal hosts.