S. Mahunka szerk.: Folia Entomologica Hungarica 58. (Budapest, 1997)

ROVARTANI KÖZLEMÉNYEK LVIII 1997 pp. 25-33 Report on the second botanical and zoological collecting trip in Mexico 1996* A. Borhidi and S. Mahunka Report on the second botanical and zoological collecting trip in Mexico 1996 - Within the framework of the Hungarian-Mexican research project aiming to elaborate the Mexican oribatid mites and their correlation with the vegetation, in the year 1996 we followed the studies started in 1995. On this base the second visit took place in Mexico between 16 June and 6 July 1996 with the participation of the authors. The experiences gained so far including the preliminary elaboration of earlier materials proved that it is inevitable to base the explorations on new collecting trips with the participation of the Hungarian experts. This is all the more desirable since materials in the laboratory of UNAM may only be used in parts in our project mainly owing to the fact that only few localities had been collected, and mainly for quantitative ecological analysis. The aim of this project designed for showing the interrelationships between soil fauna and vegetation types has never been fulfilled in previous Mexican collectings. Consequently, our main endeavour in this year was to make as extensive collecting work as possible. In order to realize this, we visited specially selected two areas of different vegetation types (South Mexican tropical rain forests in the Chiapas State and subtropical mountainous, semi-evergreen forests as well as semi-deciduous forests in the Guerrero State) which had been missing from an expected series. The research trip was organized by Dr Jose G. Palacios-Vargas, head of the Laboratorio de Ecologia y Sistemática de Microartrópodos of the UNAM. In the Guerrero State our escorts were Rosa Maria Fonseca and Ernesto Garcia, research workers of UNAM, Botanical Department, while in the Chiapas State Gherardo Rios Saiz, research associate to Dr Palacios-Vargas. In the latter locality invaluable help was delivered by Alberto Reyes, who identified many plant species in the rich flora. Herewith we should like to say our heartiest thanks to them all, since their help greatly contributed to the success of our results. Studying the vegetation types and the mite communities inhabiting them the participants made botanical and zoological collectings to be deposited in the collection of the Hungarian Natural History Museum. Within the botanical collectings we focused epiphyllous mosses and lichens (about 600 specimens), and some phanerogamous materials (Rubiaceae). The principal aim of our zoological collectings was to secure arthropod materials for comparative puiposes. To this end we used many conservative methods (sweeping, beating, stone turning, pealing off bark, sifting and singling), the result was a wide selection * Research activities carried out in Mexico in the framework of the Hungarian-Mexican project Mex-4 supported by the Mexican CONACyT, the Hungarian Commission of the Technical Development (OMFB) and the Hungarian Academy of Sciences.