Chilota africanus africanus ( Beddard, 1897 )

Plisko, Jadwiga Danuta, 2012, An annotated checklist of the South African Acanthodrilidae (Oligochaeta: Acanthodrilidae: Acanthodrilinae, Benhamiinae), Zootaxa 3458, pp. 4-58 : 9

Chilota africanus africanus ( Beddard, 1897)

Acanthodrilus africanus Beddard, 1897: 344 .

Acanthodrilus africanus : BMNH; ZMH.

Chilota africana: Michaelsen 1900: 147 .

Chilota africanus: Michaelsen 1913a: 523, 1913b: 56 ; Pickford 1937: 552. Chilota africanus africanus Pickford, 1937: 553 ; SAMC. Chilota africanus africanus: Pickford 1937: 553 ; Zicsi 1998: 70; BMNH.

Type locality. WC, ‘From forest at George Town’ ( Beddard 1897).

Distribution. Known from eight sites in the coastal-belt, south-eastern WC: Knysna Forest - ‘Main Forest’ ( Michaelsen 1913a). Knysna Forest: Garden of Eden in rotting wood and leaf mould; Deep Walls Research Hill, soil and rotten wood. Knysna road to George, in leaf mould. Montagu Pass near the summit at ca. 1000 m asl and lower 90 m asl among tree ferns. George, above the Forest Reserve, soil and leaf mould. EC: Alexandria Forest Station, slightly north of Port Elizabeth, in coastal-belt.

Remarks. Pickford (1937: 553) informed: ‘Eight specimens were originally referred to this species by Beddard. Two of these are now in the British Museum, of which one is correctly identified while the other proved on dissection to be a specimen of Chilota lucifugus (teste G.E.P.); of the 5 complete and 2 headless tails which were found by Michaelsen (1913) in the collection of the South African Museum, there now remain 2 fully clitellate, 1 semi-mature and 1 headless specimen … (SAMC 102). The remaining are probably in the Hamburg Museum’. At present in the sample SAMC 102 there is one clitellate, abscised specimen and 3 small parts, labeled ‘ Chilota africanus africanus holotype’. BMNH collection: There is 1904.10.5.821–822 labelled ‘ Acanthodrilus africanus – type’, with no information on the locality, probably Beddard’s original material. BMNH 1938.7.1.2491–2523, labelled Chilota africanus africanus with localities: Zwart River, Montagu Pass, Garden of Eden, Knysna Forest, contain Pickford’s material. ZMH-V 7831, labelled ‘ Acanthodrilus africanus syntype’ is probably the second specimen from the sample studied by Michaelsen, indicated by Pickford as ‘ cotype ’ located in Hamburg. Specimens collected by E. Warren in 1911 in Knysna used by Michaelsen (1913a) for species redescription, not examined by Pickford but suggested by her that they were possibly deposited at the Natal Museum, are not located at present.