Female Reproductive System and Egg-shell Formation in Fasciola hepatica L.

Abstract

AN examination of serial sections of Fasciola hepatica shows that a narrow duct originates from the anterior end of the vitelline reservoir and runs for a short distance to open into a wide elliptical chamber situated in the central region of the shell gland (see diagram). According to Schubmann¹ and Stephenson², neither an ootype nor a receptaculum seminis is present in Fasciola hepatica, and, so far as I am aware, the presence of such a wide chamber has not previously been reported for this fluke. In order to distinguish the chamber from the ootype of other trematodes, I propose to call it the ‘elliptical chamber’. In this chamber the vitelline granules, the vitelline cells and the oocytes are mixed together, and here the secretion of the shell gland is discharged and the egg-shell is formed.