The watermites on this page were caught in the Netherlands, most of them are common species there. Pictures of more species are on the Dutch page. I had to add a cf. to many species names, meaning these names may be not correct. It's difficult, often impossible to determine the species from pictures. Many important details are only visible by microscoping the dead animal, but I like taking pictures of the living, and and thus often mobile animals. To be honest, almost all names on this page should have a cf., because there was no definite determination. But sometimes the possibility that it might be another species is so small, that I left out the cf.
Watermite taxonomy is complex. Somewhere in the past different land mite species moved to the water, and so the watermites may have several different ancestors. And so there are many different classifications. When you click on the picture on the left you will find a scheme I derived from a small part of the ”Taxon Tree” of the Fauna Europaeae. In that scheme the watermites are placed in the suborder Anystinae below the order of the Prostigmata.The scheme is not complete and may be not correct, it's mere purpose is showing a possible place for the species on this page. And to give you an impression of the complexity of the watermite taxonomy..
REFERENCE LIST on page 1
LINKS used (2012)
The table on this page constructed with data found on Fauna Europaea.org -
http://www.faunaeur.org/full_results.php?id=15597.
A chemotaxonomic classification on base of proteins - http://www.uniprot.org/taxonomy/92068.
Yet another taxonomic system - http://tolweb.org/Hydracarina.
More links in the REFERENCE LIST on page 1