Moniligastridae Claus, 1880

Misirlioğlu, Mete, Reynolds, John Warren, Stojanović, Mirjana, Trakić, Tanja, Sekulić, Jovana, James, Samuel W., Csuzdi, Csaba, Decaëns, Thibaud, Lapied, Emmanuel, Phillips, Helen R. P., Cameron, Erin K. & Brown, George G., 2023, Earthworms (Clitellata, Megadrili) of the world: an updated checklist of valid species and families, with notes on their distribution, Zootaxa 5255 (1), pp. 417-438 : 427

Moniligastridae Claus, 1880

Although moniligastrids are not considered part of the Crassiclitellata since their clitella have only a single layer like the Enchytraeidae , they tend to have much larger individual body size and mass than enchytraeids and are phylogenetically sister to the Crassiclitellata ( James & Davidson 2012; Schmelz et al. 2021). The family is mainly distributed in the Oriental region from south India east to the Philippines and north to southern Siberia and Japan ( Gates 1972; Perel 1997). It includes 185 species (and 19 subspecies), distributed among five genera ( Desmogaster , Drawida , Eupolygaster , Hastirogaster , Moniligaster ), of which Drawida is the most widely distributed and speciose (162 spp./sspp.). Three species, Drawida barwelli (Beddard) , Drawida japonica (Michaelsen) , and Drawida nepalensis Michaelsen , are cosmopolitan, but of these, D. barwelli is the most widely distributed. It is also sometimes mentioned under its synonymous names D. bahamensis (Beddard) , or D. beddardi (Rosa) , being reported from Africa ( Csuzdi 2005), Australia, South-East Asia, Mexico, Central America, the Caribbean, and several Pacific Islands ( Blakemore et al. 2014; Csuzdi et al. 2017).