Boros István (szerk.): A Magyar Természettudományi Múzeum évkönyve 50. (Budapest 1958)
Soós, Á.: New data to the ecology and distribution in the Carpathian Basin of Trocheta Bykowskii Gedr. (Hirudinea)
IV. The Borgó Range. 14. Borgóbeszterce. 15 Sept. 1941, leg. D u d i c h. One specimen, under a stone, in a tributary river on the right side of the Bisztrica river, at the socalled high-waterfall, between Beszterce and Borgó. V. The Great Plains. 15. Tarpa. 29 March 1942, leg. Kabáczy, Three adult specimens in a furrow found during tilling near the river Tisza. 16. Tarpa. 12 May 1942, leg. Kabáczy. Five specimens unearthed by the ploughshare during ploughing in the vicinity of the above place. The specimens were revised by professor Pawlowski. The short habitat notes accompanying the above new collecting localities of T. Bykowskii Gedr. definitely strengthen its amphibiotic habits. It is clear from the above data from the Carpathian Basin that it frequents mostly the shores of mountain brooks. It was collected but once or twice in the rivulets or springs themselves. Mostly it was found under stones near brooks, among wet pebbles or in silt, detritus or mud. The wet, watery, swampy areas fed by waters seeping from mountain slopes or from under rocks seem to be good collecting places. The above localities, disregarding the two data from Tarpa, are situated in mountainous districts, and lie between the altitudes 450 and 1027 m. a. s. 1. All these correspond to the altitudinal data of Gedroyc, Pawlowski and P e r r e t. On the other hand, the Tarpa locality on the plains, near an abandoned arm of the river, slightly above 100 meters is very striking and extraordinary. On the basis of the data at our disposal, the range as known up to now of T. Bykowskii Gedr. is the following : the environments of Genève and Neuchatel, the Mur in Steiermark and the area of the Carpathians. Even these sporadic data witness that this species may be widely distributed in the ranges of the Alps and the Carpathians, and will surely live also in the Balcan Alps. On the other hand, the typical species of the genus, subviridis Dutr., inhabits Western Europe (England, Holland, Belgium, France) and Italy. The present discontinuous range of T. Bykowskii Gedr. raises the question whether this discontinuity arises merely from the fact that there was as yet no intensive research in the intermediate territories, or whether the integrated area of the species was split into two during the ice ages and it is really absent from the places in-between. For this latter case, we know of several other examples in other animal groups. It can be established from the known lifeand feeding-habits of T. Bykowskii Gedr. that both its active (passing through river systems) and its passive (by hosts) spreading is but minimal in the first case, and impossible in the second. If the cause of its discontinuous range were to be the latter, naturally still to be proven, then the specimens of the Swiss population examined by P e r r e t ought to be compared by all accounts with the individuums of the Polish populations studied by Pawlowski and those of the populations of the Carpathian Basin investigated by the present author to find out whether they be wholly identical or if there could be shown subspecific or specific differences between them. Bibliography: l. André, E.: Catalogue des Invertébrés de la Suisse (Genève, No. 16, 1925, p. 1—51). — 2. Gedroyc, M.: Zur Kenntnis der europäischen Hirudineenarten (Bull. Int. Acad. Sei. Cracovie, Ser. B. 1913, p. 32—47). —3. G e d r o y é, M.: Pijawki (Hirudinea)
