The yearly newsletter Tentacle has been published, now for the first time on internet only. Another e-journal to mark the transition to the paperless world.



The new issue 18 has several articles that are interesting to Neotropical snail lovers.
Ignacio Agudo has an interesting wrap-up of 13 years inventory work in Brazil, Santa Catarina state. He has an impressive list of freshwater and terrestrial molluscs needing conservation attention. In total, 37 taxa out of the 116 recorded for this state are considered either vulnerable, endangered or critically endangered according to IUCN Red List criteria. Amoung the latter category are Drymaeus papyrifactus, Anthinus turnix, and Bahiensis punctatissimus.

Agudo & Lenhard give a concise overview of the introduced molluscs in Brazil. Their list has 28 terrestrial gastropods, 12 freshwater and 5 marine taxa. They also discuss seven species of which the introduction is unresolved (some authors consider them native) and 16 taxa that have potential to invade Brazil.

Conservation issues in eastern Cuba are the subject of two other papers.
Maceira & Batista discuss the problems in El Gigante Ecological Reserve. An inventory of this 10.5 km2 large reserve lists 10 species (80% endemism) of land snails. Human activities resulting in destruction and fragmentation of the habitats and introduction of wide-spread species, like Deroceras reticulatum and Succinea angustior, threatens the malacofauna.
In a second paper Maceira, Pascual & Reyes report on the species found in a second reserve, Silla de Romano. In this 2141 ha area, 25 species (76% endemic) were found during an inventory in October 2008. Here too, destruction of habitats and fragmention threatens the snail population. Wild pigs are predating on some species as food.

Clavijo et al. describe the conservation priorities for Uruguayan land and freshwater molluscs. However, land snails are only briefly mentioned in a Table and the emphasis in this paper is totally on freshwater snails. According to these authors, 46 species of terrestrial Gastropoda (63% of total) are in need of conservation action.

Finally, Régnier shows that records of extinct molluscs in the Red List are biased. A critical revision of the list revealed that the 279 species already listed, 288 species must be added. Of this new total of 566 taxa, 422 are terrestrial.

References:
Agudo-Padrón, A.I., 2010. The mollusc fauna of Santa Catarina State, southern Brasil: knowledge gained from 13 years of research. - Tentacle 18: 32-37.
Agudo-Padrón, A.I. & Lenhard, P., 2010. Introduced and invasive molluscs in Brasil: a brief overview. - Tentacle 18: 37-41.
Clavijo, C., Carranza, A., Scarabino, F. & Soutullo, A., 2010. Conservation priorities for Uruguayan land and freshwater molluscs. - Tentacle 18: 14-16.
Maceira Filgueira, D. & Batista, Y., 2010. Land molluscs conservation problems in El Gigante Ecological Reserve, eastern Cuba. - Tentacle 18: 20-22.
Maceira Filgueira, D., Pascual Pérez, R. & Reyes Brea, J., 2010. Land molluscs of the Silla de Romano Protected Area, north coast of Cuba, and their conservation problems. - Tentacle 18: 22-25.
Régnier, C., 2010. Many unnoticed extinctions: do molluscs really account for half the toll? - Tentacle 18: 2-3.

Tags: conservation, Brazil, Cuba, Uruguay, literature

Today is the official day that Naturalis will become the Netherlands Center for Biodiversity (NCB Naturalis).



As inevitable as such occasions, a happening has been organized and PR colleagues are working extra hours. To make it extra memorable, two ministers will be present... For those of you wanting to see a glimpse of all this, a webcast will be broadcasted between 13.30h and 14.30h (times GMT+1). To be seen here.
For the more science-based people, a symposium will be held from 9.30-12.30h. The keynote speech by Richard Lane, Director of Science, Natural History Museum of London, will also be webcasted. As this symposium is only for special invited guests, I will have to follow it on webcast myself.

To be continued...



During the symposium, of which I only saw the keynote (partially) through webcast, Richard Lane gave his thoughts about the future direction of taxonomy. His idea is that we will need to speed up the process of describing species, given the huge number currently still undescribed. Making use of new technologies and better ways of collaboration - both within and between institutions on (inter)national scale - he thinks that productivity can be boosted. Funding will be crucial, but need also new ways. It will be paramount to taxonomists to better present their expected results and their societal use or benefits to potential sponsors. The old way won’t work any more...

The launching session was well-organized but quite predictable. The Minister of Education, Culture and Research - a biologist himself - was passionate about the new institute. I found him impressive and inspiring. The Minister of Agriculture and Nature Protection gave a talk with all the right soundbites for the opening of the Dutch equivalent of the International Year for Biodiversity.
Now, the NCB Naturalis is officially a fact. Many years will follow of hard work and (painful) reorganisation to make it really happen...

Tags: varia

Another Bostryx species from Peru, B. bermudezae Weyrauch, 1967 occurring in Rio Cañete, Quichao. This species has - like the previous one - the formula C/3 + LM x//2, where x = 19. However, in this group of Bostryx species there are four different lateromarginals (see page 239 in this paper).



From above left, clockwise: central teeth, interactie rows, detail 4th lateromarginal, 12-13th lateromarginal.

Tags: Peru, Bostryx, radula

Alien slugs can develop easily in pest species and the increase of global horticultural trade is facilitate the entrance of new invaders (Cowie et al, 2008). This seems to apply also for Milax gagates (Draparnaud, 1801). The occurrence of this species has now been confirmed for the southern state Santa Catarina in Brazil (Agudo-Padrón, 2009).



Reference:
Agudo-Padrón, I., 2009. First confirmed record of the exotic slug Milax gagates (Draparnaud, 1801) in the Southernmost Brazil region. - Ellipsaria 11(3): 15-16.
Cowie, R.H., Hayes, K.A., Tran, C.T. & Meyer, W.M. III, 2008. Horticultural industry as a vector of alien snails and slugs: widespread invasions in Hawaii. - International Journal of Pest Management 54: 267-276.

Tags: Brazil, Milacidae, literature

Books dealing exclusively with Neotropical snails are rare. And even though the book ‘Coquillages et escargots de Guyane’ (Massemin et al., 2009) predominantly deals with seashells, it has a good section on land snails.

The subtitle reads ‘Seashells and snails from French Guiana’, indicating that it is bilingual. Basically, this is a French book with the larger part of the text translated into English (including identification keys). However, the first part of the book is in French only; it deals with an introduction to molluscs, geography of French Guiana and habitats of snails.


Simpulopsis corrugatus Guppy, 1866

The second part is an illustrated guide to all the species known from this country and adjacent areas. Of the nearly 400 pages, 60 are devoted to land snails. An illustrated key is given to families and species, followed by a characterization of each family and treatment of each species. Ecological data are provided, as well as distribution maps of the occurrence within French Guiana. Each species is beautifully photographed. Of many species, also pictures of living specimens are given.
An index to scientific names, a glossary and a short bibliography make this book a complete reference guide.

Going through the book, I noticed only one apparent mistake, Nesopupa maasseni being misspelled most of the times the species was cited. But such an error is easily forgiven in the context of this beautiful publication.
Already three years ago, during WCM, there were rumours about this book. The authors and editors surely have taken their time. But it was really well worth waiting for. I would like to congratulate Olivier Gargominy, author of the chapter on terrestrial snails, for delivering such a nice piece of work.

Reference:
Massemin, D., Lamy, D., Pointier, J.-P. & Gargominy, O., 2009. Coquillages et escargots de Guyane. Seashells and snails from French Guiana: 1-456. Mèze, Biotope / Paris, Muséum national d’Histoire naturelle.
Price € 70,00.

Tags: French Guiana, publication, literature

Several weeks ago I noticed a message on the Taxacom list about the Systematics Research Fund. Based in the UK, this is a fund that is open to biologists all over the world. It offers small grants to cover e.g. contributions to publication costs, time on analytical equipment, specimen preparation or fieldwork equipment.
They have a long track record of applications being awarded that spans more than 10 years.

With a possible opportunity to do some work on carination later this year, it was a chance to apply for some money to cover additional field work and thereby potentially increase the depth of the study. However, being open to anyone anywhere, no doubt the competition will be very stiff. If you don’t see me listed on their page of awarded projects later this year, I wasn’t ‘standing out in the crowd’.

Tags: varia

Admittedly, the quality of these pictures is not as we see them nowadays. But remeber, this is a series of ‘lost and found’. SEM photographs made in the early 70s of last century...

Today the species is Bostryx anomphalus Pilsbry 1944, occurring in Peru, near Lima. in the Rio Rimac and R. Santa Eulalia valleys.



From left to right, clockwise: Central teeth, first and second laterals, interactions between rows and detail of teeth 19.

The radular formula is C/3 + LM 22/2.

Tags: Bostryx, Peru, radula

Several months ago, I mentioned the 6th Southern Connection Congress, to be held in Argentina, Bariloche on 15-19 February. Don’t ask me how I fixed it (BTW: interesting story :-), but I will attend... And since it will be the first time since 34 years that I will re-visit Latin America, I’m quite excited.



One of the preparations to be done, is preparing a presentation. At the time I had to decide about the form (oral or poster), the schedule of the program wasn’t ready yet. So I decided to keep on the safe side and choose the poster. Recently I learned that posters will be presented in a plenary meeting, while oral presentations will be done in a parallel session and have to compete with three concurrent symposia at the same time.

I will give more details about the congress and my trip in upcoming posts, but let me tease you with a sneak preview of my poster.

Tags: congress

Alien snails can also come in handy. Helix aspersa is an introduced species in the Neotropics. Ianistcki et al. (2009) have used this species to monitor the air quality in a Brazilian city.


The purpose of this study was to biomonitor metropolitan areas of Porto Alegre (Brazil) for PAHs associated with atmospheric particles and check their effects on the DNA of the land mollusk Helix aspersa. The sampling sites are located in an urban area with heavy traffic: (i) Canoas, (ii) Sapucaia do Sul, and (iii) FIERGS/Porto Alegre. The samples were collected during a continuous period of 24 hours during 15 days using Stacked Filter Units (SFU) on polycarbonate filters (two separated size fractions: PM10-2.5 and PM<2.5). The concentrations of 16 major PAHs were determined according to EPA. Comet assay on H. aspersa hemolymph cells was chosen for genotoxicity evaluation. This evaluation shows that, in general, the smaller PM-size fractions (PM<2.5) have the highest genotoxicity and contain higher concentrations of extractable organic matter. In addition, associations between chemical characteristics and PM carcinogenicity tend to be stronger for the smaller PM-size fractions. DNA damage in H. aspersa exposed to atmospheric particulate in Metropolitan Area of Porto Alegre demonstrated association with PAHs in the fine filter (PM<2.5).

Reference:
Ianistcki, M., Dallarosa, J., Sauer, C., Teixeira, C.E. & da Silva, J., 2009. Genotoxic effect of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons in the metropolitan area of Porto Alegre, Brazil, evaluated by Helix aspersa (Müller, 1774). - Environmental Pollution 157: 2037-2042.

Tags: literature, varia

Recently I wrote about a streptaxid species predating on a slug. There is another well-known snail predating group, viz. Euglandina species. In the very recently book on French Guiana molluscs (Massemin et al., 2009), there is a series of pictures illustrating how Euglandina striata feeds on Leiostracus ruthveni.


I will come back on the book in an upcoming post.

Reference:
Massemin, D., Lamy, D., Pointier, J.-P. & Gargominy, O., 2009. Coquillages et escargots de Guyane. Seashells and snails from French Guiana: 1-456. Mèze, Biotope / Paris, Muséum national d’Histoire naturelle.

Tags: ecology, varia

On this website I found a picture of Bothriembryon tasmanicus (Pfeiffer, 1853). I don’t know if it is a common species on Tasmania, but anyway, pictures of living snails are always a good find. It is said to belong to a different subgenus, Tasmanembryon, but it would be interesting to see if the molecular data corroborate that view. Anyone around there to collect some specimens?

Tags: Bothriembryon, Australia

These photos are of a rare Baja Californian species, Spartocentrum vanduzeei (Hanna, 1923).



From left above, clockwise: overview of radula, central teeth and first lateral, L13-19, L5-9. The formula is C/3 + LM 24/2.

Tags: spartocentrum, Mexico

Another endemic snail from St. Lucia, Brachypodella tatei (Crosse, 1872), from Union Garden trail, in humid forest.



This picture was taken in November 2000 by Ad Hovestadt.

Tags: West Indies, Urocoptidae

This is a photo of one of the endemic species of the island of St. Lucia. It is Naesiotus luciae (Pilsbry, 1897) and was taken west of Desbarra.



This picture was taken by Ad Hovestadt during his recent trip to the island in November 2009. Thanks Ad!

Tags: West Indies, Naesiotus

Berendtia is a monotypic genus occurring in Mexico, Baja California. One specimen of B. taylori (Pfeiffer, 1861) has been dissected (Breure, 1978: 159), but the radula has never been figured before.


From upper left, clockwise: central teeth, interaction between rows, LM7-13, LM14-21.

The formula is C3 + LM 30-34/2.

Tags: Berendtia, Mexico, radula

Videos of living snails predating on other molluscs are rarely seen. Olivier Gargominy posted today a video on YouTube, showing how the slug Elisolimax vittatus (Fischer, 1883) is predated by the strepatxid land snail Gulella corneola (Morelet, 1885).




Olivier wrote me that he sampled both species and when he wanted to photograph them, put them on the mossy bark. The result can be seen here. Gulella didn’t completely devour the slug, but was a little daunty. The contents of the stomach and intestine was left untouched.

This isn’t a Neotropical story though, the film was shot on the Comores.

Tags: ecology, varia

I’m not only a supporter of open access to scientific publications, but also to open standards and freeware (or at least low-cost) software for academic uses. And, crucially, cross-platform.
For taxonomists, building keys is essential. However, software packages are scarce and usually commercial.

Lucid is one of these commercial packages and is more and more in use. Although it may be arguably seen as a marketing trick to lure you, I don’t want to withhold from you that currently Lucid 3.3 may be grabbed here for free.
The latest version is 3.5 and of course has more features, but I think version 3.3 is still an offer not to be refused. No warranty or support, however, and only for personal use. You need to register first as a member of Lucidcentral.org.

Tags: bioinformatics

For those of you interested in the ongoing debate on open access publishing, the Open Access News might be a good source to keep on track.
The Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition (SPARC) issues a newsletter, of which the latest issue summarizes the advancement during 2009.

Tags: publishing, varia

In another recent publication, Christine Parent and Guy Coppois tell the story of their fascination with Galápagos land snails and their concerns about conservation issues with these animals.


Coppois has a long experience with field work on these islands, visiting the archipelago for the first time in 1973 and continuing during 30 years. He succeeded to collect more than 80 taxa of bulimulids. One of his most remarkable finds was the discovery of living specimens of Naesiotus achatinellus (Forbes, 1850). This only one of the species with a very restricted distribution range and which probably has vanished into extinction. Several species are on the Red List of endangered species.
Habitat destruction and the negative impact of introduced predators and competition of alien pest species, like veronicellid slugs, may be considered the main causes of the decline of land snails on these islands.

The personal stories of both authors reveal their fascination with this group, which is a thankful subject for studies in evolutionary biology.


Reference:
Parent, C.E. & Coppois, G., 2009. On the snails’ trail: evolution and speciation among a vanishing tribe. In: De Roy, T. (ed.), Galápagos: preserving Darwin’s legacy: 74-81. Firefly Books, Richmond Hill, Ontario.

Tags: Ecuador, Naesiotus, conservation, literature

The land snails of the Galápagos archipelago are amoung the best studied Neotropical snails. Thanks to Christine Parent and co-workers, much progress has been made on our understanding of the ecology and phylogenetic relationships of this group (Parent & Crespi, 2006; Parent et al., 2008).

Recently, a new paper was published with details on the ecology of these species (Parent & Crespi, 2009). Although Galápagos bulimulids are not host-plant specific, they are distributed in space according to different local microhabitats, with differences in substrates, plant species, vegetation types and resting places. The authors also notice an elevational variation in shell shape associated with moisture levels, with more slender shells at lower elevations and more conical shells at higher.
In this study a three-level zonation is followed (coastal, dry lowland, humid highland). Endemic plant species are used as a proxy for resource and habitat complexity. The effect of ecological opportunity and intraspecific phenotypic variation is also quantified by the number of congeners. The results show that the number of congeners inhabiting the same vegetation zone is negatively correlated with the degree of intraspecific variation in shell shape and resource heterogeneity was positively correlated. Ecological opportunity is greatest on younger islands, where relatively high resource heterogeneity combines with low interspecific competition.

The main conclusion of this study is that competition and resource heterogeneity are significant determinants of interspecific phenotypic variation in the context of adaptive radiation.

It should be noted (again) that the taxonomic treatment of this group in this paper is misleading. Galápagos bulimulids are not Bulimulus but should be placed - for now - in Naesiotus. Their proper relationships and taxonomic placement will be treated in one of my upcoming papers. Nevertheless, the authors have done an insightful study into the ecological relationships, which stimulates further research.


Reference:
Parent, C.E. Caccone, A. & Petren, K., 2008. Colonization and diversification of Galápagos terrestrial fauna: a phylogenetic and biographical synthesis. - Phliosopical Transactions of the Royal Society, B 363: 3347-3361.
Parent, C.E. & Crespi, B.J., 2006. Sequrntial colonization and diversification of Galápagos endemic land snail genus Bulimulus (Gastropoda, Stylommatophora). - Evolution 60: 2311-2328.
Parent, C.E. & Crespi, B.J., 2009. Ecological opportunity in adaptive radiation of Galápagos endemic land snails. - American Naturalist 174: 898-905.

Tags: Ecuador, Naesiotus, ecology, literature

The year 2010 has started. As always, it is unknown what the future will bring. However, one thing is certain: biodiversity loss will continue. 2010 is another countdown year, despite the fact that many new taxa will be described.



Let’s look at the things that have been planned and (most probably) will take place. Related to biodiversity is the reorganization of the National Museum of Natural History Naturalis to the Netherlands Center for Biodiversity Naturalis. It is more than just a new name. The Zoological Museum Amsterdam and the National Herbarium will be fusing, making it one of the bigger natural history institutions in Europe.
This sounds like competition. But in my view science is not about competition, getting top rankings and ‘rat racing’ for resources. Science should contribute to a better understanding of nature, enabling society to survive in a better way. Understanding the role of biodiversity is one of the key topics for sustainable development. And, hopefully, even understanding the role of snail biodiversity is a contribution to mankind.
If we continue to make such contributions during 2010, it will be rightly Year of Biodiversity.

Tags: varia