Sheikh Sajan

• Doctor of Philosophy
• Scientist at Gujarat Institute of Desert Ecology

To understand the distribution pattern, we sampled the malacofauna of the Gundichaghagi waterfall in Keonjhar district of Odisha in India. A total of 223 live and dead specimen shells were collected, belonging to 20 species (11 species of aquatic and nine species of land snails) comprising 17 genera and 10 families. The land snails Cryptozona semir...

Preliminary Checklist of Mollusks of India

Bathytormus acuminatus, was first described by Kobelt in 1885 from Singapore and never been reported after the original description. However, during the previous survey conducted by the scientist of the Zoological Survey of India, B. acuminatus was collected from 30 m off Gangavaram coast of Andhra Pradesh coastal water, India. The current study pr...

A new species of the head-shield sea slug is described herein from an examination of the morphological and anatomical characters. A molecular analysis supported the novel status of the species. This species is named Melanochlamys droupadi n. sp. in the honour of the Hon'ble president of India, Shrimati (Mrs) Droupadi Murmu. It is the second species...

Based on the materials deposited in the National Zoological Collection of the Zoological Survey of India, Kolkata, the present paper is diagnosed and reports first occurrences of the cordiform bivalves Cardilia martini Deshayes, 1844 belonging to the family Cardiliidae from Andaman Islands of India. The cordiform shell with sculpture smooth anterio...

In this study, the Albatross turrid Gemmula diomedea, previously reported from the Philippines, and South China sea is recorded for the first time from Visakhapatnam, East coast of India. The present paper reports the range extension of the Albatross turrid from the Philippines and South China Sea to the Bay of Bengal in India. Detailed taxonomic d...

The planorbid freshwater snail Gyraulus saltensis was originally described from “Katas Nallah, Salt Range” by the French malacologist Louis Germain of the Muséum National d’histoire Naturelle, Paris (MNHN). The description was based on the collections made by Dr Sunder Lal Hora from hillsides at Katas, Salt Range, and the specimens housed in the Zo...

The new combination Pseudonapaeus purii (Ray, 1951) (= Ena purii Ray, 1951) is proposed, based on a morphological re-examination of the type specimen of a land snail housed in the National Zoological Collections of the Zoological Survey of India, and re-discovered after a gap of 67 years from the proximity of the type locality. The occurrence of su...

A predatory sea snail Sulcerato recondita (Melvill & Standen, 1903) previously reported from South Africa and Gulf of Oman, is reported for the first time from Gulf of Kachchhin India. The detailed description along with an illustration, and information on distribution of the species is provided herein. The nearest distribution record for S. recond...

A new species of head-shield sea slug, Melanochlamys bengalensis, is described from the northern part of the eastern coast of India using both external and internal morphological characters. Its novel status is supported by a molecular analysis. The maximum likelihood (ML) genetic tree (COI gene sequence) indicates that the new species represents a...

This chapter deals the current status and updated checklist of non-marine molluscs (Gastropoda and Bivalvia) of Great Nicobar Biosphere Reserve in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands of India based on the survey conducted as part of the Nicobar Expedition by ZSI and published information from the Great Nicobar. A total of 90 species have been recorded...

Oxyperas lentiginosum (Gould In: United States Exploring Expedition during the years 1838, 1839, 1840, 1841, 1842 under the command of Charles Wilkes. Boston 12:1–510 1852), a rare mactrid clam, is reported from the Kakinada fishing harbour, Andhra Pradesh, East coast of India. A single right valve specimen was collected from the fish landing centr...

Tonoscolex kalimpongensis Ahmed & Julka sp. nov. is described from Neora Valley National Park in the Kalimpong district of West Bengal, India. The new species is easily distinguished by the presence of one pair of spermathecal pores at intersegmental furrow 7/8. An updated checklist of the genus Tonoscolex and an identification key to the Indian To...

Ex situ conservation and preservation of biological diversity (especially endangered species) is always a challenge for conservationists and policymakers regarding development of proper management strategies (Lane, 1996; Soberón et al., 2000). Most of the ex situ efforts, such as in vitro tissue culture, museum collections, captive breeding, aquari...

The River Ganga is among the most holy and largest rivers in India, flowing from Goumukh glacier in Uttarakhand to the Bay of Bengal at Ganga Sagar in West Bengal, covering 2,500 km and draining ~26% of the landmass of the country. The Ganga was also considered among the most polluted rivers of India, largely because of uninterrupted discharge of u...

The critically endangered forest owlet (Athene blewitti) is endemic to Central India. We carried out a survey of the forest owlet in East Kalibhit forests, in Khandwa District of Central India using call broadcast surveys, in 367 grid cells admeasuring 500 x 500 m each, and assessed potential ecological factors in the same cells. We carried out sel...

The current chapter attempted in preparing an updated checklist of the molluscs (non-marine) of the Gangetic plains biogeographic zone including Upper (7A) and Lower Gangetic plains (7B). A total of 143 species of the non-marine molluscs (71 species of terrestrial molluscs and 72 species of freshwater molluscs) belonging to 37 families and 76 gener...

There has been, and to some extent remains, confusion over the valid genus name for a group of slugs in the family Veronicellidae, either Vaginulus Férussac, 1822 or Vaginula auctt., often cited as of Berthold, 1827 or sometimes as of Blainville, 1828. We show that Vaginula was first made available as an emendation of Vaginulus Férussac by Hoffman...

Within the scope of our long-term biodiversity assessment for the Indian Himalayan region, shells of Carychium indicum were collected in the Great Himalayan National Park in Kullu District (Shakti Village) of Himachal Pradesh (31°47'04.2"N, 77°26'31.308"E). These finds constitute a new record for this species in the relative region of Benson’s type...

Spiraculum beddomei Blanford, 1866, a rare operculate land snail, was described in 1866 from Kimety (=Kimery) Hills, near Waltair (Vizagapatam), Madras Presidency in India has been reported nearly after 150 years from the adjoin Eastern Ghats landscape of Mahendragiri Hills in Gajapati district of Odisha in India. Here, we present new locality and...

A rare species of bivalve clam Mactra aequisulcata G. B. Sowerby III (1894) reported for the first time from the Vengurla beach along the Sindhudurg coast of Maharashtra and nearby coastal stretches from the west coast of India. After comparing with the type illustration and malacological collections present in the National Zoological Collections o...

The validity of Laevicaulis as the objective senior synonym of Eleutherocaulis , both published simultaneously in a complex and confusing work as genus-group names for veronicellid slugs, is confirmed. The type species, in both cases by subsequent designation, is Vaginulus comorensis , a junior synonym of Vaginulus alte , now Laevicaulis alte, a wi...

The knowledge on the non-marine malacofaunal diversity of the Indian Desert Biogeographic Zone is restricted due to the extreme climatic conditions and scope for limited exploration of the area. Although, the hostile environment of the desert does not seems to offer an ideal ambience for snails to survive; however, there are resilient species of un...

This chapter provides an overview of the land and freshwater molluscs hitherto collected and recorded from the Semi-arid biogeographic zone of India, including Punjab plains (4a) and Gujarat Rajputanas (4b) biogeographic provinces. The current chapter renders 93 species, of which 35 freshwater (excluding a subspecies and “variety”) and 58 species o...

The knowledge on the floral and faunal composition of protected areas (PAs) is crucial for formulating suitable conservation plan. In this paper, inventory and species richness of non-marine molluscs of Chintamoni Kar Bird Sanctuary has been made and is for the first time from any PA of West Bengal. A total of 276 specimens belonging to 22 species...

The current chapter deals with the updated list of the deep sea cephalopods of India. A total of 54 species belonging to 27 genera, 16 families and six orders of the class Cephalopoda have been documented by various research team from Indian Ocean, Bay of Bengal and Arabian Sea and much of the collections are reported through deep sea faunal explor...

The current chapter attempted in preparing an updated checklist of the gastropods (non-marine molluscan fauna) of the Western Ghats biogeographic zone including the Malabar Plains (5A) and Western Ghats (5B). In this current checklist, we documented 354 species of the non-marine gastropod molluscs (297 land forms and 57 freshwater form) from Wester...

Horseshoe crabs are currently threatened by escalating human stresses along the Indo-Pacific coastline. Conservation of their remaining populations, however, is hindered by limited baselines throughout their ranges. We performed a questionnaire survey of conservation experts from diverse geographic regions to identify baselines, prominent threats,...

412 species-group names (including 11 replacement names), and 14 genus-group names of the Alycaeidae have been introduced to date. Type materials of 85% (336) of the known species and subspecies were examined, a further 5% (19) of the taxa were studied using available non-type material, and for another 6% (22) the original descriptions were suffici...

Members of the family Truncatellidae Gray, 1840 are widely distributed globally, but their presence in India is unclear. So far, only one species Truncatella guerinii A. Villa & J. B. Villa, 1841 has been reported from the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, but most malacologists were unsure of its occurrence due to the lack of appropriate descriptions a...

Inventory of molluscan fauna of East Kolkata Wetlands was done through field surveys and collections from different localities of the wetlands. A total of 24 species of freshwater Mollusca belonging to 22 species of gastropods and only 2 species of bivalves recorded during the surveys, out of the 2111 specimens examined. The gastropods are belongin...

High-spired South and Southeast Asian Streptaxoidea has been classified mostly in the Diapheridae, and partly in the Streptaxidae, and the systematic position of several of them has not been resolved yet. The examination of conchological characters and the analysis of the homologies of apertural barriers revealed that some new genera must be introd...

Through the present manuscript, we are reporting for the first time the presence of Cyclophorus pfeifferi Reeve, 1861 in India. Previously, this species of land snail was reported only from South-East Asian countries Malaysia, Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam. The specimens were collected during field sur- veys in Dampa Tiger Reserve in Mizoram state...

The operculate land snail family, Alycaeidae is comprised of species often <10mm in diameter and most species are known to be narrow-range endemics. Most Indian alycaeid species are known to be distributed in the Eastern Himalaya and the Western Ghats, whereas only a single species, Dicharax strangulatus (L. Pfeiffer, 1846), is known to be distribu...

The present communication deals with 17 species of freshwater and land Mollusca from 16 genera, 11 families and 3 orders, recorded from the state of Haryana. Of these, 4 species from terrestrial and 13 species from freshwater habitats of which three are bivalves and 10 are gastropods. Idiopoma dissimilis (O.F. Müller, 1774), Physella acuta (Draparn...

Indian land snails comprise about 1130 species that are distributed throughout the Indian landscape in diverse habitats. However, most of the Indian land snail species have only been recorded from their type locality, with a minimal description, and have not been reported thereafter. In this paper, the endemic pupinid land snail Rhaphaulus assamicu...

Here, we have reported a type Pupina peguensis Benson, 1860 lost long from a general lot of the Zoological Survey of India (ZSI) and provided an accession number to the specimen as “holotype”. This pupinid snail was donated by the Asiatic Society of Bengal to the Indian Museum and thereafter, transferred to the ZSI. Unfortunately, the specimen was...

Malacological research in India has a long and productive history going back to the early 19 th century, initially promoted by the Asiatic Society of Bengal and with significant material, including type material, deposited in the Indian Museum in Kolkata. Following the birth of the Zoological Survey of India (ZSI) in 1916, the Museum’s collecting a...

The terrestrial semi slug Austenia resplendens (Nevill, 1877), which was earlier reported only from the Upper Myanmar region has been recorded for the first time from Dampa Tiger Reserve in the Mizoram state of northeast India. The new distributional record of this species extending the geographic range in North-eastern India indicates the long dis...

It is necessary to properly use public funds towards the development of the nation as well as reduce stress to local biodiversity and mitigate climate change issues. In this context, the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEF&CC), Government of India (GoI) has formulated the National Mission on Himalayan Studies (NMHS) for sustena...

Two minute marine gastropod species, Pseudoliotia henjamensis (Melvill & Standen, 1903) and Cyclostrema ocrinium Melvill & Standen, 1901, of the families Vitrinellidae and Liotiidae respectively, are here reported for the first time from India.

The life on a rugged mountains, harsh climatic condition and alpine-arid pastures vegetation act as a challenging task for adaptation of the flora and fauna in the Trans-Himalaya biogeographic zone. In this chapter we provide an updated checklist of land and freshwater molluscan fauna of Trans-Himalaya. The compilation of this study was based on th...

Here, the clarification of the “type” status for Cyclophorus (Glossostylus) koboensis Godwin-Austen, 1915 catalogued by Nantarat et al. (2014) is corrected and briefly discussed.

In spite of being a marine living resource of immense economical and ecological importance, the population status and habitat requirements of Indian horseshoe crabs are not adequately known in India. The beach-dynamic and extensive mudflat in North-east coast is reportedly sheltered for sympatric occurrences of Tachypleus gigas and Carcinoscorpius...

A new species of the genus Macrochlamys has been described from Western Himalaya, India. A total of 12 dry and seven live specimens of Macrochlamys leggeae sp. nov. were collected from the high-altitude region of Valley of Flowers National Park and are described here as a new species based on morph-taxonomy, conchological differences, and character...

During the malacological survey in the Dalma Wildlife Sanctuary and different regions of Saranda forests of Deccan peninsula in Jharkhand, an unusual Florida's native freshwater mollusc Seminole Rams-Horn, Planorbella duryi from South Karo River was encountered. Earlier, this non-indigenous species was reported from the Godavari River in the Nasik...

We present a new record of a little known tree snail Amphidromus sinensis (Benson) from the Similipal Biosphere Reserve in Odisha. It is the first record from the peninsular region of India and is remote from the previously known range. The distribution suggests either dispersal of the species through the Malayan region to northeast India, through...

As per the Article 7(a) of the UN Convention on Biological Diversity, Identifying components of biological diversity importance for its conservation and sustainable use is the first step for in-situ conservation of the species. On the other hand, there are more than 50% of the faunal diversity, yet to be explored and documented, particular in count...

Two new jumping spider species: Nandicius vallisflorum sp. n. , (♀) and Pellenes himalaya sp. n. (♂, ♀), are diagnosed, described and illustrated in detail. The specimens were collected from the Valley of Flowers, western Himalayas, Uttarakhand State of India.

The extremely high reproductive capacity of Lissachatina fulica (Férussac, 1821) caused serious effect on the local biodiversity and acts as a serious pest for agriculture, forestry and hamper the livelihood. The L. fulica from its route invasion from Kolkata has spread upto Himalayan region of India. Although, river Hooghly acts as a barrier for i...

The book describes the various methods and measures to follow during the faunal investigations in the Indian Himalaya. Chapters include - 1. Introduction 2. Monitoring Protocol for Mammals 3. Monitoring Protocol for Birds 4. Monitoring Protocol for Herpetofauna 5. Monitoring Protocol for Insects 6. Monitoring Protocol for Freshwater Health 7. Monit...

The terrestrial gastropod species richness in the Himalayan region of India tends to be high. But, due to vast altitudinal elevation range, it is often difficult to assess the diversity, species composition and habitat requirements in detail within a restricted time windows. Hence, a detailed sampling and monitoring protocol would help in the enume...

A study on the socio-biodiversity was conducted in Kotagarh Wildlife Sanctuary (KWS) and nearby areas of Odisha, where the population of Kutia-Kandha tribe is dominant. It was found that, forest has provided tribes with enough materials traditional used for therapeutic purpose. Information from secondary sources by interviews were conducted in eigh...

The freshwater and land molluscs inventory survey was conducted in connection with our approved annual programme of research entitled " Species diversity and richness of molluscan fauna of Himachal Pradesh " From April 2012 to March 2015. During survey period we have collected 633 examples of Molluscs (both Land and Freshwater). Total 25 species ar...

A common well-known species of class gastropoda, Pila virens (Lamarck, 1822) is reported and illustrate with four photos and characteristics. A taxonomic key for Indian Pilids is also given. The members of the family Ampullariidae are the mostly abundant in both lentic and lotic habitation such as streams, ponds, tanks, paddy fields of the southern...

The Gaur is under the vulnerable category on Red list and Schedule-I species as per Wildlife Protection Act (1972) in India. Till date, little information is available on group size and age-sex composition of Gaur from Kuldhia Wildlife Sanctuary. Thus, by keeping the same in mind an investigation of group size and age-sex composition of Gaur was ca...

This report is an outcome of the assigned project sanctioned to the Zoological Survey of India (ZSI) by the National Centre for Sustainable Coastal Management (NCSCM), Chennai on "Mapping horseshoe crab habitat in India" for the period from September 2014 to March 2015.

Owing to its small population and discontinuous distribution in Central India, the Forest Owlet is declared as a Critically Endangered Species by IUCN. In December 2012 we began a long-term study of the distribution, demography and ecology of Forest Owlet in Khandwa district of Madhya Pradesh. In the first phase of the project, an intensive study a...

A total of 122 birds were recorded representing 49 families of 14 orders. Among the 15 orders :Passeriformes dominated the list with fifty six species (46%), Ciconiiformes with 20 species(16%), Strigiformes with eight species (7%), Piciformes with seven species (6 %), Coraciiformes with six species (5 %), Columbiformes and Cuculiformes with five sp...

The Odonata survey on diversity and abundance of Palamau Tiger Reserve was carried out for the first time to gives a preliminary checklist of species within the reserve. Total 30 species of Odonata were recorded at seven different ranges of which 20 species from Anisoptera and 10 species from Zygoptera. The54% species was recorded from Libellulidae...

Odonates diversity in buffer area of Similipal Biosphere Reserve was observed, where we recorded 58 species. Libellulidae was the richest family with 31 species and Orthretum was the most common genera. The sub-order Zygoptera was represented by 23 species and 35 species represents sub-order Anisoptera. Perennial river system with different habitat...