Komarekiona eatoni, or the Kentucky earthworm, is a terrestrial species of nearctic Annelid found in the southwestern United States, especially near the Appalachian Mountains.

The genus and family are named in honor of a Director of Tall Timbers Research Station and Land Conservancy.

[12][13] Due to the Last Glacial Maximum during the Pleistocene, there are very few endemic species of earthworm in North America.

[15] It ranges through Kentucky,[16][17] Illinois,[18][19] Georgia,[20] Tennessee,[21] Virginia,[22] Indiana,[23] and North Carolina.

[6] 11,000 years ago, during the Late Wisconsin stage of the Pleistocene glaciation, most species of earthworms perished.

[11] Its color is whiteish with a "slight graying anterior and posterior margins of the segments," especially near its nephropores.

[39][40] Specimens east of the Great Smoky Mountains are known to reproduce sexually, as a "brilliant spermatozoal iridescence on the male funnels and in the spermathecal coagulum" has been noted.

The author noting this discovery described this as mutagenesis, meaning: "A permanent change in the method of reproduction by an organism, as when a portion of the range is isolated from the main gene pool or centre of origin; ex.

"[11] The Kentucky earthworm is endogeic, meaning it lives in the soil and makes horizontal burrows.

[28] The species is easily found and dug up with a small hand pick "from the surface centimetres of the soil profile.

[11] It appears to go into aestivation during the drier parts of the year, unlike many other earthworm species in their range.

However, R. maximum has been found to create drier soils and phenolic repellants and toxins that may keep worms like K. eatoni away.

[42] It tends to be found in forest regions of Loblolly-Shortleaf pines, Oak-Hickory, and Oak-Pine trees.

It has also been associated with vermivorous snakes, as there is overlap in the ranges of the worm and Carphophis amoenus, Diadophis punctatus, and Thamnophis sirtalis.

When Gordon Enoch Gates returned to the United States after World War II, Pickford gave the description to him.

He loaned the specimens to Gates, who used them with the copy of Eaton's description to characterize and name Komarekiona eatoni.