Opiliones Notes

This is the "home page" for a series of notes on harvestmen,
including topics such as their phenology, habitat preferences, and the ultrastructure of their eyes, etc. This is based mainly on my information and questions from about three decades of study and research. If you can provide answers to any of the questions or provide more information relating to any aspects, I'd be pleased to hear from you.

MAJOR NEW SECTION (as of May 2010) on opilionid communities ... check it out! - even though the site's still under development.

The picture? - well, it's Mitopus morio, one of my favourite species about which there will certainly be some notes.

• Phenology is the term used to refer to the temporal patterns of appearance of species over the year.

So, as a start, you can look at seasonal abundance of harvestmen.
 
• But, just what are these Opiliones anyway? Find out about how they are classified.


• Coexistence of harvestman species is ecologically interesting - forming communities of Opiliones which vary greatly.


• Remarkably, their eyes vary with their habitat.

• Beauty is in the eye beheld... aspects of the fine structure of phalangid eye,

with some details about cell organelles, mostly in Mitopus morio, but also in Opilio parietinus.

• Even the lens of the eye is fascinating, as well as its shielding pigment,

• and the cuticle has a truly amazing structure.

• Axons and glial cells feature in the eye.

• Functional aspects of cells in the eye are revealed by enzyme histochemistry.

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