Fridericia alba Moore, 1895

Chen, Juanjuan, Zhang, Junqian & Xie, Zhicai, 2025, List of species records of enchytraeids (Enchytraeidae, Clitellata, Annelida) in China, Zootaxa 5566 (1), pp. 61-96 : 67

? Fridericia alba Moore, 1895 [nomen dubium] (T)

Fridericia alba Moore, 1895 .

[non] Fridericia cf. alba Moore. Wang, Xie & Liang 1999 .

[non] Fridericia alba Moore. Chen, 2009 .

Type locality. U. S. A., Pennsylvania, vicinity of Philadelphia .

Remarks. The type material was not found, and no details were given in the original description. After the original record, the species was never found again. Schmelz (2003) treated this poorly described species as nomen dubium because of the unavailability of new material and because differences from Fridericia sima Welch, 1914 were inconclusive.

“ F. cf. alba ” in Wang et al. (1999) differs from both F. alba and F. sima ( Schmelz 2003) , it is certainly a new species and should be given a name of its own ( Schmelz 2003). However, reference material is lost (Xie, unpublished data), and localities in southern China have not yet been resampled.

“ F. alba ” in Chen (2009) (based on specimens collected in Hubei Province) is probably a misidentification as well. “ F. alba” (Chen 2009) agree with original description in body size, shape of brain and outline of the spermatheca; it differs from F. alba Moore, 1895 in a maximum of 4 chaetae per bundle, more branched (3–6) oesophageal appendages and dorsal pore beginning at VII.

“ F. alba” (Chen, 2009) corresponds well with “ F. cf. alba ” ( Wang et al., 1999) in body size, chaetae, dorsal vessel, sperm funnel and large seminal vesicle. However, they are unlikely to be the same species, as the species described by Chen (2009) possesses five pairs of preclitellar nephridia (four in Wang et al. 1999), and differences in the number of preclitellar nephridia usually represent interspecific variations. Further differences from the species described by Wang et al. (1999) are (1) oesophageal appendages with more branches and (2) jointed spermathecae.

To conclude, F. alba recorded from China includes probably two different species, none of them identical with F. alba Moore, 1895 .