Orange Ant Spider
Ellura
Southern Reptile Tick
S3, Female, dorsal
 
                      
Southern Reptile Tick (Bothriocroton hydrosauri)Class: Animals (Animalia) - Jointed Legs (Arthropoda) - Spiders, Scorpions, Mites & Ticks (Arachnida)
Order: Ticks (Ixodida)
Family: Hard Tick (Ixodidae)     iNaturalist Observation
Species: Southern Reptile Tick (Bothriocroton hydrosauri)
This Photo:     S2, Female, dorsal, Feeding

Thank you Owen Seeman for identifying this species for us

General Species Information:
Found on Ellura (in the Murray Mallee, SA) and elsewhere
Interesting how ones 1st instinct is to try and remove this tick. However, they are just as much a part of our native world as the shingleback.
There is very little open information on ticks, etc, and without proper diagnostics we are just guessing that this is the species due to location & host; all engorged female ticks look pretty similar.
Note the tiny legs in these photos, they have 8; as do all arachnids.
Note the interesting spiracles on these

There is another tick, Adelaide's Shingleback Tick (Amblyomma limbatum), that also attacks Shinglebacks. When engorged on the Shingleback, they can't be differentiated. So S1 & S2 could be the latter. But because S3 dropped off naturally, and we got diagnostic photo's, Owen was able to id it. He said "No eyes, a little white spot at the tip of the scutum (and absence of anything on the lateral sides of the scutum), and deep grooves on the scutum (the cervical grooves)."

Copyright © 2019-2024 Brett & Marie Smith. All Rights Reserved. Photographed 12-Jan-2019
This species is an Australian Native Species, not listed in the SA Murray Mallee Survey of 2010.