OBSERVATIONS ON THE MORPHOLOGY AND LIFE-HISTORY OF THE DIGENETIC TREMATODE, LEPOCREADIUM SETIFEROIDES (MILLER AND NORTHUP, 1926) MARTIN, 1938

¹ The American Museum of Natural History, Central Park West at 79th Street, New York, New York 10024

Cercaria setiferoides, an ophthalmotrichocercous distome larva from Nassa obsoleta, was described by Miller and Northup (1926). Its life-cycle was reported by Martin (1938) and the excretory system was studied by Peters (1961). Martin found the larvae encysted as metacercariae in the turbellarian, Procerodes warreni, and in the annelid, Spio sp. The final hosts were small flounders and sand dabs. There are serious disagreements and discrepancies in the three accounts and a redescription of the successive stages in the life-cycle provides new information as well as the correction of previous errors. Experimental infections have disclosed new secondary intermediate hosts and the adult stage is regarded as identical with worms described by Linton (1940) as Lepocreadium trullaforme n. sp. But L. trullaforme was suppressed by Yamaguti (1958) as a synonym of Distomum areolatum Rudolphi of Linton, 1900, and Stunkard (1969b) redescribed that species as Lepocreadium areolatum (Linton, 1900) n. comb. This taxonomic disposition restores the validity of Lepocreadium setiferoides (Miller and Northup, 1926) Martin, 1938.

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