Claparède, 1862
Description
Large smooth pink, red or bluish worms. Body very tough; tail long and smooth, with prolonged segments, usually with yellow transversal stripes. Dark chloragogen tissue covering oesophagus from VI. All chaetae bifid. Anterior chaetae 3-8 per bundle, 80-160 µm long, upper tooth thicker and at least twice as long, bent almost at a right angle resembling a raptor's beak; the difference decreases gradually before the genital segments. Posterior chaetae with equal teeth. No ventral chaetae in XI at male pores. Small cylindrical chitinous penial sheaths, up to 4 times as long as its maximum width, inside body in XI. No large coelomocytes in body cavity. Length 35-70 mm, segment number up to 160. Easily recognized by its long thread-like tail even when young; the only species with a similar tail, Tubifex ignotus, has long hair chaetae. Much longer upper tooth in foremost chaetae and beginning of chloragogen cover at oesophagus in VI are good characters when comparing even young Limnodrilus udekemianus with its congeners, not to mention small short penial sheaths in mature individuals.
Burrowing in sediment.
Distribution
Cosmopolitan.
Ecology
In freshwater.
Reproduction
Sexual only. Eggs laid in oval cocoons with thin transparent, soft, double-walled shell, and very short appendages. Most often two eggs per cocoon.
Literature
Claparède, 1862: 243-247, Pl. 1 Figs 4-5, Pl. 3 Fig. 13, Tabl. 4 Fig. 1; Brinkhurst and Jamieson, 1971: 467-468, Fig. 8.4A-B; Chekanovskaya, 1981: 315-316, Figs 152, 153B; Hrabe, 1981: 96, Pl. 17 Figs 11,17; Kasprzak, 1981: 176, Figs 663-669.