Abstract
Zospeumpercostulatumsp. n. from Cueva de La Herrería (Llanes, Asturias) is described. It is characterized by a relatively large shell (1.4–1.8 mm height), conical, with ovate aperture, continuous peristome and thickened parietal callus; shell costulate except two first whorls; without any sort of inner formations. It is the first clearly costulate Iberian species, filling a morphological gap in the Iberian clade, and the largest species from the Cantabrian region, being the first species described from Asturias.
Highlights
The genus Zospeum Bourguignat, 1856 is the only troglobiont genus of land snails present in the Iberian Peninsula, and has been for a long time the only troglobiont genus of the family Carychiidae until the recent description of the genus Koreozospeum (Jochum et al 2015a)
Weigand et al (2013) had already demonstrated the molecular divergence between those two species and four genetic lineages conchologically grouped under Zospeum suarezi, evidencing that the biodiversity in the Cantabrian region is still far from completion
The finding of a population with sharply costulated and relatively large shells allow us to describe it as a new species, since all known Iberian species have smooth shells, and only in one of the Cantabrian species, Z. zaldivarae, shells reach 1.6 mm in height (Jochum et al 2015c)
Summary
The genus Zospeum Bourguignat, 1856 is the only troglobiont genus of land snails present in the Iberian Peninsula, and has been for a long time the only troglobiont genus of the family Carychiidae until the recent description of the genus Koreozospeum (Jochum et al 2015a). The geographical distribution comprises two disjunct areas: eastern Alps and Dinaric Alps from where about twenty species are known (Bole 1974; Pezzoli 1992; Slapnik and Ozimec 2004; Weigand 2013; Jochum et al 2015b), and the Pyrenean-Cantabrian region from where six species have been described so far. The first Iberian species described was Zospeum schaufussi Frauenfeld, 1862, collected inside an unknown Spanish cave by L. Realizing that Zospeum is more widely distributed than in the Pyrenees, Gittenberger (1980) revised new Iberian material and the type material of Z. schaufussi, revalidating the already known species and further describing Zospeum suarezi Gittenberger, 1980 from a cave in Puente Viesgo (Cantabria) and other Cantabrian caves. The finding of a population with sharply costulated and relatively large shells allow us to describe it as a new species, since all known Iberian species have smooth shells, and only in one of the Cantabrian species, Z. zaldivarae, shells reach 1.6 mm in height (Jochum et al 2015c)
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