A new African species of parasitic Dero (Annelida, Clitellata, Naididae) in the urinary tract of reed frogs.

A new species of naidid oligochaete, Dero rwandae, detected in the bladder and the Wolffian ducts of reed frogs Hyperolius kivuensis from Rwanda, is described. Until now, D. bauchiensis was the only endoparasitic Dero known to infect African frogs infesting the eyes and Harderian glands. To the best of our knowledge, the finding of D. rwandae is the first record of an African Dero species infecting the urinary tract of anurans. In general morphology, the two African Dero parasites resemble each other, but differences in the features of ventral setae morphology exist. Parts of the mitochondrial 16S rRNA locus and the nuclear 18S and 28S rRNA loci were sequenced to assess the phylogenetic relationships to other Dero spp. Among those few species, that are barcoded so far, the closest relative of the new taxon is D. superterrenus, a free-living South American species. The species groups formerly termed subgenera Allodero, Aulophorus and Dero within the genus Dero do not represent distinct evolutionary lineages and the genus is paraphyletic including Branchiodrilus.