India’s newest recorded snail named after Western Ghats.

June 16, 2022

The new snail has been described in latest issue of Molluscan Research, an international journal, by Amrut Bhosale, Tejas Thackeray of the Mumbai-based Thackeray Wildlife Foundation and Omkar Yadav of the Medha-based Amdar Shashikant Shinde Mahavidyalay.
This species is endemic to Vishalgad Conservation Reserve in Shahuwadi tehsil of Maharashtra’s Kolhapur.
It is named after the type locality of the species in the northern part of the Western Ghats, which is Sahyadri in Sanskrit.
According to the study, the ‘Sahyadri snail’ is distinguished from other Indian and Southeast Asia’s Haploptychius in having a sub-oblique helical shell, low spire and presence of a strong parietal lamella.
The species was placed in the genus Haploptychius based on the shell morphology and genital characters.