Distribution of trichodorid nematodes in Great Britain

Abstract

SUMMARYThis survey describes the distribution of trichodorid nematodes in Great Britain. Twelve species were recorded, including the newly described species Trichodorus hooperi Loof, 1973 and the first British record of T. sparsus Szczygiel, 1968. In the survey 3614 samples and records were analysed using the Statistical Package for Social Sciences computer programme. Seven hundred and ninety‐two positive sites, containing 971 trichodorid populations, were located. Outline maps show the geographical distribution of each species. T. primitivus de Man, 1880 was the most commonly found species and had a cosmopolitan distribution. Paratrichodorus pachy‐dermus Seinhorst, 1954 was the next most prevalent and occurred mostly in eastern England and Scotland. Populations of the other ten species were more restricted in both number and distribution. The distribution of trichodorid spp. with respect to altitude, soil type, pH and primary vegetation was tested using chi‐squared contingency tests. A significant relationship between nematodes and environmental factors was found in all cases examined. However, interactions were found between several environmental factors and further tests were applied to study the independence of the species distributions with respect to these interactions.