Family MOLICOLIDAE Beveridge & Campbell, 1989
Introduction
The family Molicolidae is characterised by four bothridia, and an atypical heteroacanthous armature in which the external surface of the tentacle possesses a band of small hooks. In the proglottis, an acessory seminal vesicle is present, and the uterus is deviated porally (Campbell & Beveridge 1994). The genera of the Molicolidae are closely related to those of the Gymnorhynchidae, but the two groups were separated by Beveridge & Campbell (1989) to reflect differences in patterns of the tentacular armature.
The cosmopolitan species Mollicola horridus, found commonly in the liver of the sunfish, Mola mola, was the first species of trypanorhynch cestode to be formally recorded from Australian waters Macleay (1877). Now two molicolid genera are recorded for Australia, with three species.
General References
Beveridge, I. & Campbell, R.A. 1989. Chimaerarhynchus n.g. and Patellobothrium n.g., two new genera of trypanorhynch cestodes with unique poeciloacanthous armatures, and a reorganisation of the poeciloacanthous trypanorhynch families. Systematic Parasitology 14: 209-225
Campbell, R.A. & Beveridge, I. 1994. Order Trypanorhyncha Diesing, 1863. pp. 51-148 in Khalil, L.F., Jones, A. & Bray, R.A. (eds). Keys to the Cestode Parasites of Vertebrates. Wallingford, UK : Commonwealth Agriculture Bureaux International 751 pp.
Macleay, W. 1877. Notes on the entozoa and epizoa taken from a sunfish. Proceedings of the Linnean Society of New South Wales 1: 12-13