Heavily armored scutacarid mites hitch rides on larger arthropods in their search for food,tumbling off when they arrive at a source.

Supersize foot pads enable feather mites to hold fast to their avian hosts. This species trails sensory hairs used for navigating and finding mates.

Rabbit ear mites chew on their unwitting host. The rabbit scratches, its ear oozes, and the mite feasts on the fluid.

Box mites retract their limbs and snap shut when threatened.

Frontipoda is a predatory mite that lives in small ponds and feeds on larval midges. A relative of spiders and scorpions, it has eight legs, as do most mites, although some have fewer limbs.

Gamasellus is a blind predator that uses sensory hairs on its front legs to locate prey and large, toothed pincers to capture them. It then injects a deadly cocktail into its victim.

Mites of the genus Schwiebea are found in many places, from soil and tree cavities to mushrooms, decaying wood, and swimming pools.

The eating end of an oribatid soil mite is equipped with "more tools than a Swiss army knife," They include short pincerlike appendages and tiny limbs for handling food.

Scientists are discovering that mites are exquisitely adapted to nature's every niche. Case in point Colorful beads of water-repellent wax ensure that a moss mite stays dry in its damp world.

Magnified hundreds of times, this predatory soil mite is the terror of its microscopic world.