A Rare Snail is Seen in Brazil - Observation of the Week, 11/15/23

Our Observation of the Week is this Sanniostracus carnavalescus snail, seen in Brazil by @nagylafachetti!

Nágyla Fachetti Coser works at Sooretama Biological Reserve, which is “the largest conservation unit in the state of Espírito Santo, with more than 27 thousand hectares of forest,” she tells me. “I have always been interested in nature, but this interest strengthened when I started working here and having closer contact with the forest, which is home to enormous biodiversity, which I love.”

A few weeks ago, Nágyla was helping to monitor one of the reserves trails when she spotted the snail you see above. “I saw it in a tree and at first I hesitated to record it as I already had many records of snails,” she says, “but I later photographed and posted it to iNaturalist.”

Nágyla’s observation is one of only eight observations of the species on iNat, and I reached out to Daniel Cavallari (@danielcavallari), a Brazilian taxonomist who recently coauthored a paper that moved the snail from Leiostracus to the genus Sanniostracus, which he says is “a portmanteau of two lexicons, ‘sannio’ (Latin for ‘harlequin’). and ‘ostrakon’ (Greek for ‘shell’).”

As far as we know, it is endemic to the Atlantic Forest of southeastern Brazil. While it was described in 2016, the stretch of forest where the species was initially found was deforested to make way for tomato cultivation. This left us concerned about the possible extinction of the species, but other individuals were observed (including here on iNaturalist) later. We were scared, but considering the vulnerability of land snails to climate change and such, it was a well-founded scare!

“I still don't have training in the environmental area,” says Nágyla (above). “I'm currently taking a technical course on the environment and I'm interested in all groups of living beings. I always try to photograph as many individuals, animals, plants, fungi, and later post them on iNaturalist.”

I use iNaturalist, because this is a platform that brings together nature lovers from all over the planet. through it I can acquire a lot of knowledge, discover the names of species that I photograph and contribute to science and research. I can photograph a rare species, or even one that has not yet been described, and thus attract more researchers to explore the enormous biodiversity of the reserve.

Using iNaturalist has certainly changed my relationship with the natural world. Now I am more attentive to issues of conservation and preservation of nature, I am increasingly willing to see its beauty, even in small details, like tiny animals and fungi, for example.

(Photo of Nágyla by Sheyla Rossi. Nágyla wrote to me in Portuguese. I used Google Translate, and performed some alterations to the quotes for clarity and flow.)

- Daniel also coauthored this paper, which looks at the utility of iNat as a tool when studying tropical mollusks!

- check out two past terrrestrial gastropod observations of the week, one from @souhjiro, and another from @pizzamurderer!

- Sanniostracus carnavalescus belongs to the family Bulimulidae. Take a look at some of the most-faved observations of that taxon!

Posted on November 15, 2023 09:44 PM by