A new species of Haploptychius Möllendorff, 1906 (Stylommatophora: Streptaxidae) from the Western Ghats, India

ABSTRACT

We here describe a new species of the streptaxid snail genus Haploptychius from the northern Western Ghats of Maharashtra, which is the third member of the genus from India. Haploptychius sahyadriensis n. sp. is distinguished from the other Indian and South-East Asian Haploptychius sp. in having suboblique-heliciform shell, low spire and presence of one strong parietal lamella. The new species has unique genital anatomy in having a long penis with a penial sheath, the presence of penial appendix, penial hooks, atrium and vagina with longitudinal ridges and irregular transverse ridges respectively, but without any hooks. It bears a shiny muscle near the junction of the vagina, gametolytic duct and the free oviduct. Based on the shell morphology and genital characters, the new species is placed in the genus Haploptychius. Our study reveals that other unexplored areas in the northern Western Ghats may potentially harbour more undescribed land snail species which could be endemic.

Publication LSID: lsid:http://zoobank.org:pub:18C6E99C-6FDE-46A6-8E12-EB834D588910

KEYWORDS:

• Streptaxid snail
• northern Western Ghats
• penial appendix
• penial hooks
• shiny muscle

Acknowledgements

We are grateful to Maharashtra Forest department for providing necessary permits. We would like to thank Santosh Saste, Ravindra Suryawanshi and Santoh Chalake for their help during the fieldwork. AB wishes to thank the Hon. Principal, Vice Principal and Zoology Department staff of Sadguru Gadage Maharaj College, Karad for help during this study. We also thank Anita Eschner and Jon Ablett for providing images of Streptaxis pfeifferi from type material and the Godwin-Austen collection respectively. We thank Mansingh Nimbalkar (Department of Botany, Shivaji University, Kolhapur), Sarafraj Mujawar and Suhas Sutar (Department of Physics, Yashwantrao Chavan Institute of Science, Satara) for assisting AB with SEM work. Ben Rowson (National Museum Wales), Pradip Yadav (LBS, Satara) and Vishal Patil (Manali Resort, Amba) helped during the study. Akshay Khandekar, Swapnil Pawar, Sagar Nalawade, Suhas Kadam, Gopal Raut, Tejas Patil, Satpal Gangalmale, Ganesh Jadhav, Priyanka Patil, and Vivek Waghe helped with field and laboratory work. S. Talmale and Rahul Khot assisted with registering specimens at ZSI and BNHS respectively. We thank Barna Páll-Gergely and Junn Kitt Foon for reviewing the manuscript, and the Associate Editor, Frank Köhler, for valuable editorial feedback.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by a Research Award from the Malacological Society of London [grant number 00 to AB]; Systematics Research Fund of the Systematics Association and the Linnean Society of London, UK [grant number 00 to AB]; Shivaji University, Kolhapur under Research Initiation Scheme [SU/C&UD. Section/117/137 to OY].