428 Records of the Indian Museum. [Vox*. XXIV, 



The Earthworms of Kashmir. 



Our knowledge of the worms of Kashmir has hitherto been 

 meagre in the extreme. In the Report on the Natural History 

 Results of the Pamir Boundary Commission, published in 1898 

 (1) Alcock states: "Three species of earthworms were obtained, 

 one in the Kishenganga Valley at 8100 ft., one in the Gilgit River 

 Valley at over 7000 ft., and one in the Yasin Valley at 8000 ft. 

 Specimens of all of these were sent to Mr. F. E. Beddard, F.R.S., 

 who writes as follows concerning them : ' They are entirely 

 European, i.e. Palaearctic species ; they belong, in fact, to the 

 usual British forms. This is of interest, as being an approxima- 

 tion to discovering the limits of the Oriental region for worms.' " 

 Michaelsen in 1909 (3) identified three species (Eisenia rosea 

 (Sav.), Helodrilus (Allolobophora) caliginosus subsp. trapezoides 

 (Ant. Dug.), and Helodrilus (Bimastus) parvus (Eisen) in collections 

 received from the Indian Museum ; and I had a Limnodrilus, 

 species unrecognizable, sent to me from one of the high lakes (9). 

 Thus the only identified species of Oligochaeta from this region 

 are the three recorded by Michaelsen. 



This is perhaps surprising, seeing that Kashmir is a favourite 

 summer resort, and is visited annually by large numbers of 

 travellers from all parts of India, and indeed from other parts of 

 the world also. There are possibly two reasons for the paucity of 

 the collections. One is that Kashmir is a. holiday country, and 

 zoologists who visit it are doubtless concerned rather in providing 

 for themselves a change of interests than in pursuing their usual 

 occupation ; — at least this -has been the case with myself. The 

 other is that it has been recognized that Kashmir belongs to the 

 Palaearctic region, and not to the Oriental, which is of greater 

 interest to Indian naturalists. 



The present small collection contains only three identifiable 

 species, of which two have been previously recorded, while one is 

 new. These all belong to the IyUmbricinae, a Palaearctic group. 



The Range of the Lumbricinae. 



The Lumbricinae are a recently evolved and dominant group 

 of earthworms, which possesses great powers of adaptation to new 

 surroundings, and of which numerous species have been carried 

 by man and have established themselves all over the world. 



The occurrence of these peregrine species of Iaimbricinae 

 gives no clue, therefore, to the zoogeographical affinities of the 

 region where they are found ; and since Beddard's and Michaelsen's 

 records are entirely of these " world- wanderers," it would have 

 been permissible to regard Kashmir as possessing no proper 

 earthworm fauna of its own, and therefore as not to be included 

 in the territory of any particular family or group of Oligochaeta. 



Some little time ago, however, I described a new species of 

 Lumbricine from Murree in the Himalayas (10), a few miles only 

 from the southern border of Kashmir. In addition, one of the 



