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Contribution to the knowledge of the door-snail (Gastropoda: Clausiliidae) fauna of Georgia

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The Caucasus region is among the most important Eurasian biodiversity hotspots (Zazanashvili et al. 2004, Walther et al. 2014). Its mollusc fauna is far from being well-explored and, as indicated by a number of recent studies, one could reasonably expect further taxonomical discoveries in this region. The diversity and distribution of the mollusc fauna are especially little known, as only few precise locality records have been published for most of the species (Walther et al. 2014, see also http://www.caucasus-snails.uni-hamburg.de/CaucasianLandSnails-Dateien/Checklist.html). This paper has three objectives, namely (i) clarifying the question of possible genital polymorphism in Pontophaedusa funiculum (Mousson) (Fig. 1), (ii) presenting georeferenced distribution records (Appendix 1) and shell photographs (Figs 2–15) of clausiliid species collected during a field trip in Georgia in June, 2012 in order to contribute the better knowledge of the region's biodiversity, and (iii) providing a comprehensive list of Caucasian door-snail literature.
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... By contrast, the tumultuous first half of the 20th century proved unfavourable for mollusc studies, yielding only few clausiliid-related papers (Rosen 1914;Kokochashvili 1940Kokochashvili , 1941Javelidze 1941). Thereafter a renewed interest in the region's land snails resulted in several further contributions (Likharev and Rammelmeier 1952;Likharev and Lezhava 1961;Likharev 1962;Lezhava 1962Lezhava , 1964Lezhava , 2004Nordsieck 1975Nordsieck , 1976Natsvlishvili 1967;Sysoev and Schileyko 2009;Pokryszko et al. 2011;Fehér et al 2014;Mumladze et al. 2017;Hausdorf et al. 2018;Mumlaze and Szekeres 2020;Neiber et al. 2021) that considerably increased our knowledge of the Georgian Clausiliidae fauna. As a result, the taxonomic positions and distribution areas of the species, as well as the fauna composition became quite well assessed. ...
... The occurrence data listed in the Results are based on georeferenced samples that were collected during the past two decades. For comparison, the maps showing the occurrence points also include well defined locality data that have been provided in the publications of Majoros and Németh (1997), Pokryszko et al. (2011), Fehér et al. (2014, Mumladze et al. (2017) and Neiber et al. (2021). ...
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