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Common Earthworm

Common Earthworm.jpg Spiny Hermione ( Hermione hystrix )ThumbnailsBalanoglossus clavigerus . (Young specimen, greatly enlarged)Spiny Hermione ( Hermione hystrix )ThumbnailsBalanoglossus clavigerus . (Young specimen, greatly enlarged)Spiny Hermione ( Hermione hystrix )ThumbnailsBalanoglossus clavigerus . (Young specimen, greatly enlarged)Spiny Hermione ( Hermione hystrix )ThumbnailsBalanoglossus clavigerus . (Young specimen, greatly enlarged)Spiny Hermione ( Hermione hystrix )ThumbnailsBalanoglossus clavigerus . (Young specimen, greatly enlarged)Spiny Hermione ( Hermione hystrix )ThumbnailsBalanoglossus clavigerus . (Young specimen, greatly enlarged)
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Like all other Oligochaetes, Earthworms are androgynous. The genitals are usually in the 9th to 15th segments. In this same body division, the Lumbricides red blood-filled closed vasculature, which sometimes partially shimmers through the skin, has particularly wide, beating ringing vessels that connect the two large blood vessels above and below the digestive tract. A little further back, about the middle of the front half of the body, you will notice the girdle during the reproductive period, especially in spring. This organ, necessary for mating, is characterized by skin glands, which secrete a lot of mucus and is formed by swelling of the back and sides of 6 to 10 rings; depending on the species, its color varies from whitish or yellowish to red and brown. The species are also distinguished by the position of the belt; it begins between the 20th and 30th segments. The eggs are laid in a slime layer formed by glands of the belt, which surrounds the body in an annular manner; from this mucous layer, after the Worm has stripped it of itself, a cocoon with a horny wall, containing several eggs, only hatches.

Author
The Life of the Animals, Part 3, Chapter 6
The Worms
By AE Brehm
Captions are translated from the original Dutch by online means
Available from gutenberg.org
Dimensions
1049*396
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