⇒ India’s newest recorded snail ‘Haploptychius sahyadriensis’ is named after Western Ghats. The Haploptychius sahyadriensis is endemic to the Vishalgad Conservation Reserve in Maharashtra’s Kolhapur district. The Western Ghats of Maharashtra have yielded a carnivorous land snail new to the world of science.
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.
About Snail:
The Haploptychius sahyadriensis, recorded from the northern Western Ghats of Maharashtra, is the third member of the genus Haploptychius.
- The other two – H. andamanicus and H. pfeifferi – were recorded in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands in the 1860s.
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 new species also has a unique genital anatomy. It has a long penis with a penial sheath and hooks, atrium and vagina with longitudinal ridges and irregular transverse ridges but without any hooks.
- The species was placed in the genus Haploptychius based on the shell morphology and genital characters.