VOL. IV.] California Earth -Worms. 249 



With these first rains in October the worms leave their self-made 

 clay chambers and ascend to the upper strata where they live and 

 propagate during the winter months, until April and Maj', when 

 the same process of summer- rest is gone through again. In the 

 large and dry valleys earth-worms are always scarce, owing, 

 of course, to the greater dryness of the plains in summer time. 

 In the driest places the worms are entirely wanting, except, 

 possibly, in some bogs and swamps, where an indigenous species 

 of Allolobophora is always common. 



The higher earth-worms (the water-worms excepted) in Cali- 

 fornia can be referred principally to two large families, Lum- 

 bricidae and Eudrilidse, there being besides one single species of 

 Acanthodrilidae. It must, however, be stated that the Pacific Coast 

 has not been thoroughl}' explored, and many more species, genera 

 and families, are likely to be discovered. A species of Perichaeta 

 is found in a nursery hothouse in San Francisco, undoubtedlj'- 

 introduced from the tropics. In the Baja California cape region 

 other tropical forms appear, and the common earth-worm there 

 is a species of Urochseta, as-well as one or more of Allolobophora. 



So far no true earth-worms have been described or even 

 enumerated from California with the exception of two species 

 described by Kinberg. About thirty years ago he visited Cali- 

 fornia and described Lumbj-icus apii from Sausalito near San 

 Francisco and Pheretima Californica from the same place. But 

 the descriptions of these species are so insufficient that the worms 

 cannot even be identified as to family, much less to genera and 

 species. They must of course be ignored. 



' ' Pheretima," he says, " has from forty to fifty-six setse on every 

 segment, and was found both in the hills of San Francisco and 

 in soil at Sausalito." But though I have repeatedly' searched in 

 those localities I never succeeded in finding any worms thus 

 characterized, and I am inclined to think that Kinberg' s labels 

 became mixed, and that Pheretima at least was never found in 

 this State. Of the family Lumbricidae California possesses 

 probably a dozen species, some of which are common the world 

 over. There are, however, a number of indigenous species, the 

 description of which will be reserved for a future article. The 

 most common of the Lumbricidae is a large species of Allolobo- 



