Two new species of protandric pheretimoid earthworms belonging to the genus Metaphire (Megascolecidae : Oligochaeta) from Taiwan

This paper describes two new species, each consisting of two subspecies, of protandric, octothecal pheretimoid earthworms from Taiwan. They are Metaph ire paiwanna sp. nov. typica, Metaphire paiwanna var. liliumfordi subsp. no v., Metaphire bununa sp. nov, typica and Metaphire bununa var, glareosus su bsp. nov. The var. typica of both new species occurred on the west side of the Central Mountain Range, whereas the subspecies, liliumfordi and glareos us, occurred on the east side of the range. Apparently, the Central Mountai n Range constitutes a geographical barrier for isolation and subspeciation. Metaphire paiwanna has a male disc medial to male pore (opening of copulat ory pouch) with a horizontal ridge, the character shared by holandric and s exthecal Amynthas swanus (Tsai) of Taiwan and Metaphire aggera (Kobayashi) of Korea and Manchuria, whereas M. bununa resembles more closely holandric, octothecal Metaphire riukiuensis (Ohfuchi) of the Riukiu Islands than prot andric, octothecal Metaphire stephensoni (Michaelsen) of Indochina.