Parasitology, Harold W. Manter Laboratory of
Document Type
Article
Date of this Version
3-1921
Citation
Journal of Parasitology (March 1921) 7(3): 114-128, + 1 plate.
Also appeared as Contributions from the Zoological Laboratory of the University of Illinois, number 176.
Abstract
For several years an interesting trematode has been under observation in the laboratory here. It occurs in various species of turtles, and was first discovered in some material shipped in from the south for class work. Peculiar importance attaches to the fact that it is a species inhabiting the circulatory system, and in fact it shows a relationship to the blood-inhabiting flukes of man which has become more clearly evident as the observations have accumulated. Since the material is easily obtained, it will afford perhaps the best opportunity available in this country for the laboratory study of forms adapted to this peculiar environment, so that, despite the incompleteness of the observations, the publication of this note is justified. It is further called for by the fact that several others, who had their attention called to this species, plan to give it a more detailed study than I can make at the present time, and will be glad to have a record of the facts thus far determined in order to utilize them as a basis for further study.
For this very unique species I propose the name Proparorchis artericola gen. et spec. nov.
The parasite has been found in several distinct species of turtle from widely separate localities. Thus, according to records of the collection here, it has been met with in Pseudemys elegans from Havana, Illinois, USA. in Malacoclemmys leseuerii from Newton, Texas, in Pseudemys scripta from Raleigh, North Carolina, USA, and in Chrysemys marginata from Fairport, Iowa, USA.
Comments
Public domain material.