Diorchilepis, LYKOVA ET AL., 2006

DIORCHILEPIS LYKOVA ET AL., 2006

Diagnosis (according to Lykova et al., 2006): Small cestode with serial heteronomous maturation. Strobila can consist from one to four series of either male or hermaphroditic proglottides. Proglottides acraspedote. Scolex with rudimentary rostellum. Suckers expanding far beyond margins of scolex. Osmoregulatory canals without transverse anastomoses. Genital pores dextral. Cirrus-sac long, crossing midline of proglottid or even aporal osmoregulatory canals. Cirrus armed. Internal seminal vesicle absent; external seminal vesicle elongate. Testes two in male and hermaphroditic proglottides, one poral and one antiporal, situated in row at posterior margin of proglottis. Ovary trilobed. Vitellarium entire, postovarian. Seminal receptacle indistinct. Uterus initially horseshoe-shaped, sacciform in gravid proglottides, not extending into lateral fields. Asian part of the Palaearctic.

Type and only species: Diorchilepis ezoensis (Sawada & Koyashu, 1991) Lykova et al., 2006 (syn.: Ditestolepis ezoensis Sawada & Koyashu, 1991 ).

Remarks: Diorchilepis is the only not yet sequenced genus of the ‘ Ditestolepis clade’. It is morphologically most similar to Ecrinolepis ; the main difference between the two genera is the number of testes in proglottides. Ecrinolepis has two testes in male and three testes in hermaphroditic proglottides, while all proglottides in Diorchilepis contains only two testes ( Fig. 4H, J). Diorchilepis ezoensis was found in Nagano and Ishikawa Prefecture, Hokkaido, Japan ( Sawada & Koyasu, 1991a; Sawada et al., 1992; Sawada & Harada, 1993). However, descriptions and figures provided in these publications contain some differences and discrepancies. Therefore, it is difficult to say whether they reported the same species. We attempted to re-study the type material deposited in the Meguro Parasitological Museum but, unfortunately, it did not contain any mounted slides and material in the vial proved to be in a very poor condition, unusable for morphological study. A morphological examination of fresh, properly fixed, specimens from Japanese shrews is necessary to clarify the taxonomic status of D. ezoensis .