Mark J. Wetzel was recently appointed Associate Editor of the journal, Megadrilogica. Mark has been assisting editor Dr. John Reynolds (Oligochaetology Laboratory, Kitchener, Ontario, Canada) and the journal's editorial board with these duties for several years, including maintenance of the journal's website http://www.inhs.uiuc.edu/~mjwetzel/Megadrilogica.home.html, the index to all volumes and issues of the journal (September 1968-), and links to other websites focusing on megadrile oligochaetes.
Editor John Reynolds and the journal Megadrilogica were mentioned in the most recent (May 2007: vol. 111, No. 5) issue of National Geographic, in the article (pp. 32-55) by Charles C. Mann entitled, ''America, Found & Lost''; this article (the first of two in this issue focusing on the legacy of Jamestown), begins with a discussion on how the [now] common nightcrawler, one of the more widely distributed earthworms in North America, was but one of many introductions by the English settlers that has contributed significantly to changes in our continental ecosystem.
Mark has also been working with Dr. Reynolds for several years, preparing the fourth supplement to Nomenclatura Oligochaetologica, a catalog of names, descriptions, and type specimens of the Oligochaeta (terrrestrial, marine, estuarine, and freshwater taxa). This fourth supplement, Nomenclatura Oligochaetologica - Supplementum Quartum, includes all taxa described since publication (1993) of the third supplement in this series. To date, we have included two new families, 80 new genera, 28 new subgenera, and over 1550 new species (1993-2006). Finalization of this volume is anticipated by the end of summer 2007, with publication projected later in 2007. The website for this nomenclator series is here: http://www.inhs.uiuc.edu/~mjwetzel/Nomen.Oligo.html.