''Pheretima praepinguis'' is a huge

earthworm An earthworm is a terrestrial invertebrate that belongs to the phylum . They exhibit a tube-within-a-tube , are externally segmented with corresponding internal segmentation, and usually have on all segments. They occur worldwide where soil, wa ...

about half meter long of genus

Pheretima ''Pheretima'' is a genus of earthworms found mostly in New Guinea and parts of Southeast Asia. Species belonging to the genus Pheretima have a clitellum, which is a band of glandular tissue present on segments 14 to 16. Individuals are hermaphr ...

. ''Pheretima praepinguis'' lives in Emei mountain,

Sichuan Province Sichuan (; , ; alternatively romanized as Szechuan or Szechwan) is a landlocked province A province is almost always an administrative division Administrative division, administrative unitArticle 3(1). , country subdivision, administr ...

, China, and is one of the most featured organisms living in the place. It's trivially called "Big Earthworm of Emei"() or "Toudilong" (, literally means "dragon which can go through the earth").

History

In 1931, Yi Chen (), a honored Chinese biologist, researched some samples of an earthworm from Mount Emei, Sichuan Province. At that time, he suggested that it should be classified into ''Pheretima tschiliensis''. However, G. E. Gates found out that such earthworm is different with ''Pheretima tschiliensis''. They can be distinguished by the location of the primary spermathecal pores in parietal invaginations. He then named this earthworm after ''Pheretima praepinguis'' in 1935. Although Yi Chen insisted that ''Pheretima praepinguis'' is a synonym of ''Pheretima tschiliensis'' in an article published in 1936, this name is ubiquitously accepted nowadays.

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q33495162 Megascolecidae

History

See also

References