| Hypolimnus
pedderensis
|
HOME |
| |
| Kingdom |
Animalia |
Reconstruction
of the Lake Pedder Earthworm. Based on an image from Threatened Species
Unit (2000). Created by Peter Maas
for The Extinction Website. This
image has been released under
the Creative
Commons Attribution Non-commercial No Derivatives 3.0 Licence.
|
| Phylum |
Annelida |
| Class |
Oligochaeta |
| Order |
Haplotaxida
|
| Family |
Megascolecidae
|
| Genus |
Hypolimnus |
| Species |
Hypolimnus pedderensis |
| Authority |
(Jamieson, 1974) |
| |
| English
Name |
Lake
Pedder Earthworm |
| Dutch
Name |
Lake Pedder
Regenworm |
| |
| Synonyms |
Perionychella
(Vesiculodrilus) pedderensis Jamieson,
1974; Diporochaeta pedderensis (Jamieson, 1974). |
| |
| Taxonomy |
Initially
described as Perionychella (Vesiculodrilus) pedderensis
by Jamieson (1974). Taxonomy revised by Blakenmore in 1996. |
| |
| Characteristics |
The
Lake Pedder Earthworm is 50 mm in length and 1.6 mm in diameter. This
species has 129 body segments and is coloured pale brown. It has multiple
gizzards that occur on the fifth, sixth and part of the seventh segment,
which is an important taxonomic character. (Threatened Species Unit 2000) |
| |
| Food |
It
probably fed on microbes and/or
algae on sand particles or organic
matter amongst the sand, because the gut contents of the single specimen
contained sand (Threatened
Species Unit 2000). |
| |
| Range
& Habitat |
 The
Lake Pedder earthworm was endemic to Tasmania, Australia. It was collected
from a substrate sample on the
main beach of Lake Pedder, near where
Maria Creek came to the lake. No information on habitat was provided in
the original description of the
Lake Pedder earthworm by Jamieson (1974)
other than that the specimen was sorted from interstitial
fauna. From this it is assumed that the Lake Pedder
earthworm favoured living in sandy, waterlogged sediments
(Blakemore 1996). (Threatened
Species Unit 2000)
Photo: original Lake Pedder,
1970. Photographed by Jon Deeprose. Taken from Wikimedia
Commons and released
under the GNU Free
Documentation License. |
| |
| History
& Population |
The
Lake Pedder Earthworm is only known by the type specimen collected from a
beach on Lake Pedder, Tasmania in 1971. In 1972, the area was inundated
for hydroelectric power generation. The world heritage area fauna program
has commissioned two surveys to
search for populations of this
species. The first, by Dyne (1991), surveyed several sites
around the new Lake Pedder. A second, more extensive
survey was conducted by Blakemore (1996), to
determine the conservation and taxonomic status of Lake Pedder earthworms
and to determine whether the Lake Pedder Earthworm still existed in the
area. Both surveys failed to
locate any Lake Pedder Earthworms. Several new species were found,
however, none are conspecific to the Lake Pedder Earthworm and the species
is likely to be extinct due to inundation of its original and unique
habitat. (Blakenmore 2003) No new
surveys are likely to be funded unless new information
is made available (Threatened
Species Unit 2000). |
| |
| Extinction
Causes |
The
Lake Pedder Earthworm's extinction is caused by the destruction of its
original habitat (Dyne 1991; Blakemore 1996). The original natural Lake
Pedder was flooded by damming in 1972 by Hydro Electric Commission (Wikipedia
contributors 2008).
|
| |
| Conservation
Attempts |
The
only location where the Lake Pedder earthworm was known to occur was
within the Southwest National Park which is part of the Tasmanian
Wilderness World Heritage Area (Threatened
Species Unit 2000). |
| |
| Museum
Specimens |
Only
the type specimen is known. Do you know where it is kept? Please contact
this website. |
| |
| Relatives |
The
Lake Pedder Earthworm is included in the Megascolecidae, a large family of earthworms which has native representatives in Australia, New Zealand, Southeast and East Asia, and North America. |
| |
| Links |
Lake Pedder earthworm - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
IUCN
Red List of Threatened Species: Hypolimnus pedderensis
|
| |
|
References
(Complete
website)
|
Blakemore,
R. J. 1996. The Taxonomic Status of the Earthworm Fauna of Lake Pedder,
Western Tasmanian World Heritage Area. Report to the Parks and Wildlife
Service, Tasmania. 40pp.
Blakenmore, R.J. 2003. Hypolimnus
pedderensis. In: IUCN 2007. 2007 IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. <www.iucnredlist.org>.
Downloaded on 06 April 2008.
Dyne, G. R. 1991. The status of the
Lake Pedder earthworm, Perionychella
pedderensis and investigations into the new or little-known
earthworms from the Western Tasmanian World Heritage
Area. A report to the Department of Parks, Wildlife &
Heritage.
Jamieson, B. G. M. 1974. The
Indigenous Earthworms (Megascolecidae:
Oligochaeta) of Tasmania. Bulletin of the British
Museum of Natural History (Zoology). 26(4): 201-328.
Threatened Species Unit. 2000.
Listing Statement Lake Pedder
Earthworm Diporochaeta pedderensis. Nature Conservation
Branch, Department of Primary Industry, Water and
Environment, Tasmania.
Wikipedia contributors, 2008.
"Lake Pedder," Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Lake_Pedder&oldid=203644218
(accessed April 6, 2008).
|
|
Last
updated: 16th April 2008.
This
page is a part of The
Extinction Website.
© 2000-2009. |