Haplotaxoididae, Martin & Fend & Martinsson & Klinth & Torii & Erséus, 2024

Martin, Patrick, Fend, Steven, Martinsson, Svante, Klinth, Mårten, Torii, Takaaki & Erséus, Christer, 2024, Towards an integrative revision of Haplotaxidae (Annelida: Clitellata), Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society (zlae 141) 202 (4), pp. 1-38 : 14

Haplotaxoididae fam. nov. (clade 3 in Fig. 1 )

ZooBank LSID: urn:lsid:zoobank.org:act:C439AB3E-4C5B-46AD-83BD-11603F48A3D3

Type genus: Haplotaxoides Fend gen. nov.

Diagnosis As for type genus.

Remarks

The new family closely resembles members of Haplotaxidae in general habitus. Although the narrow-elongate body form, thick integumental cuticle, and the unpaired chaetae (with enlarged ventrals) all closely resemble those of Haplotaxis , differences in pharyngeal musculature, ventral glands, coelomocytes, and position of the (metagynous) ovaries suggest a separate family on morphological grounds. The establishment of the new family is also justified with molecular data, as all species of the genus Haplotaxoides are grouped together in a clade with maximal support, distinctly separate from Haplotaxidae s.s. within the phylogeny of Clitellata ( Fig. 1 ).

Figures

Figure 1. Phylogenetic tree of Clitellata estimated with Bayesian inference in MrBayes, using a concatenated set of markers, i.e. 12S, 16S, COI, 18S, and 28S. The tree is rooted such that Parvidrilidae and Randiellidae (also Clitellata) appear as lineages outside the rest of the ‘Clitellata’ tree, a position strongly supported by the metagenomic analyses of Erséus et al. (2020). Haplotaxid like taxa are shaded.Support values at branches are posterior probabilities, scale represents expected number of changes/site. Capital letters at the end of the species codes in Haplotaxis indicate countries of origin.BEN: Benin, FR: France, GR: Greece, IT: Italy, JP: Japan, SE: Sweden, US: USA. Inset, photo of live specimen of Haplotaxis spSE in its natural habitat, soil soaked in groundwater, photo: Johan Wingborg, and photo of live specimen of Haplotaxis spBEN6, photo: Patrick Martin.