''Obama ficki'' is a large

species In biology, a species is the basic unit of classification and a taxonomic rank of an organism, as well as a unit of biodiversity. A species is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriate s ...

Brazil Brazil ( pt, Brasil; ), officially the Federative Republic of Brazil (Portuguese: ), is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. At and with over 217 million people, Brazil is the world's fifth-largest country by area ...

ian

land planarian Geoplanidae is a family of flatworms known commonly as land planarians or land flatworms. These flatworms are mainly predators of other invertebrates, which they hunt, attack and capture using physical force and the adhesive and digestive proper ...

in the subfamily Geoplaninae.

Description

''Obama ficki'' is a large land planarian with a broad and flat leaf-like body. The largest specimens reach more than 20 cm in length. The color of the dorsum is composed by a greyish-brown background covered with numerous fine black spots. The ventral side is orange. The several eyes of ''O. ficki'' are distributed marginally in the first centimeters of the body and posteriorly become dorsal, occupying around 30% of the body width at the median third of the body. The

pharynx The pharynx (plural: pharynges) is the part of the throat behind the mouth and nasal cavity, and above the oesophagus and trachea (the tubes going down to the stomach and the lungs). It is found in vertebrates and invertebrates, though its struc ...

is collar-form. The

esophagus The esophagus (American English) or oesophagus (British English; both ), non-technically known also as the food pipe or gullet, is an organ in vertebrates through which food passes, aided by peristaltic contractions, from the pharynx to the ...

is very short. The prostatic vesicle is tubular and shape and consists of two portions; the proximal portion is short and forked, while the distal portion is unpaired and loops into the bulbar muscular coat. The male atrium is short, and the penis papilla is conical, extending into the female atrium. The common glandular ovovitelline duct is short. The female atrium is elongate with an ample lumen, and is longer than the male atrium; no folds that would separate the atria are present.

Etymology

The

specific epithet In taxonomy, binomial nomenclature ("two-term naming system"), also called nomenclature ("two-name naming system") or binary nomenclature, is a formal system of naming species of living things by giving each a name composed of two parts, bot ...

was given in honor of Israel Alberto Fick, for "his collaboration in collecting various specimens of land planarians", which were deposited at the (Flatworm Research Institute) of

Unisinos Unisinos (Portuguese: ''Universidade do Vale do Rio dos Sinos'' -- literally "University of Bells' River Valley") is a Brazilian private Jesuit university founded in 1969. Its main campus is located in Southern Brazil, in the city of São Leopol ...

Distribution

The habitat of ''O. ficki'' includes seasonal and moist forests in northeast

Rio Grande do Sul Rio Grande do Sul (, , ; "Great River of the South") is a Federative units of Brazil, state in the South Region, Brazil, southern region of Brazil. It is the Federative_units_of_Brazil#List, fifth-most-populous state and the List of Brazilian st ...

and east Santa Catarina, southern Brazil.

Ecology and behavior

''Obama ficki'' has been observed to feed on terrestrial gastropods; it has been observed to consume certain invasive species, such as '' Bradybaena similaris'' and ''

Deroceras laeve ''Deroceras laeve'', the marsh slug, is a species of small air-breathing land slug, a terrestrial pulmonate gastropod mollusk in the family Agriolimacidae. Distribution The distribution of ''Deroceras laeve'' was originally Palearctic, from ...

''. When tracking down prey, ''O. ficki'' follows the trails of substrate left by gastropods. Due to its large size, ''O. ficki'', when catching up to prey, is able to easily cover the gastropod with its body to immobilize it. When this is done, ''O. ficki'' can evert its

and attach it to the prey, crushing it into smaller pieces before sucking it into the intestine.

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q25095538 Geoplanidae Platyhelminthes of Brazil