Dr. Holló Ferenc szerk.: Parasitologia Hungarica 3. (Budapest, 1970)

Parasit. Hung. 3.97-118.1970 Lice (Phthiraptera) of Mammals in Hungary Dr. Feliks PIOTROWSKI Department of Zoology WSP, Gdansk The earliest report about the fauna of sucking lice (

Anoplura

) infesting Hungarian mammals appeared at the end of the nineteenth century when KOHAUT (1897) published a checklist of nine species. At that time it was in Europe one of the few publications dealing with the subject. Some years later, this list was extended by CSIKI (1904, 1905) and DUDICH (1923), up to 15 species. Unfortunately, the above mentioned publications, with the exception of DUDICH'

s paper, do not contain information about the localities and dates of the collections, and only a very modest range of the specimens of that time have been preserved. The fauna of biting lice (

Mallophaga

) living on mammals in Hungary had been examined, almost exclusively, by EOHAUT (1897). Later, PONGPJÍ.CZ (1914) took up the subject. However, his work does not indicate whether the collected biting lice came from Yugoslavia or from Hungary. Thus is seemed advisable to start research to supply fuller and more up - to - date information about lice, both sucking and biting, occurring on mammal

s in Hungary at present. This task was initiated a few years ago by the Hungarian Natural History Museum. I am indebted to Dr.

István SZABÓ, Curator of Parasitology, and to Dr.

Zoltán KASZAB, Head of the Zoological Department, for ceding the Museum's material for further research. My sincere thanks are also due to all who assisted me in my work in the county.