&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;REDESCRIPTION OF &lt;em&gt;VIVIPARUS SPHAERIDIUS&lt;/em&gt; BOURGUIGNAT 1880 WITH AN IDENTIFICATION KEY OF THE EUROPEAN &lt;em&gt;VIVIPARUS&lt;/em&gt; SPECIES (GASTROPODA: VIVIPARIDAE)&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

Peter Glöer,Dilian Georgiev

doi:10.37828/em.2014.1.14

REDESCRIPTION OF VIVIPARUS SPHAERIDIUS BOURGUIGNAT 1880 WITH AN IDENTIFICATION KEY OF THE EUROPEAN VIVIPARUS SPECIES (GASTROPODA: VIVIPARIDAE)

Peter Glöer, Dilian Georgiev

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.37828/em.2014.1.14

Copy DOI

Abstract

Dilian Georgiev found topotypes of Viviparus sphaeridius Bourguignat, 1880, which has not been mentioned in the West European literature since its original description, except one citation by Westerlund (1886: 7). The rediscovery of this species is provided. As a result, V. sphaeridius is considered to represent a species in its own rights well distinguishable from the other European species in the genus Viviparus. Additionally, a key to the Viviparus species from Europe is given to facilitate future identification and prevent further misidentifications

Highlights

Many Viviparus spp. have been described (Bourguignat 1880, Westerlund 1886), of which four species are accepted by western European malacologists to occur in Central Europe: V. contectus (Millet, 1813), V. vivparus (Linnaeus, 1758), V. ater (Christofori & Jan, 1832), V. acerosus (Bourguignat, 1862), and two additional species which are distributed in the Balkans, the region of Montenegro and Albania: V. mamillatus (Küster, 1852) and V. hellenicus (Clessin, 1879) in Greece
The identity of V. sphaeridius mentioned by Starobogatov 2004 (p. 267, pl. 95.2) could only be compared by the drawing and the given distribution range by Kantor et al (2009: “rivers and lakes of the basins of Danube, Dnieper and Dniester rivers ...”), both coincides with our findings
Because the recent sampling site Marten is opposite to Giurgiu the collected Viviparus sphaeridius can be accepted as topotypes (Fig. 1)

Summary

Introduction

Many Viviparus spp. have been described (Bourguignat 1880, Westerlund 1886), of which four species are accepted by western European malacologists to occur in Central Europe: V. contectus (Millet, 1813), V. vivparus (Linnaeus, 1758), V. ater (Christofori & Jan, 1832), V. acerosus (Bourguignat, 1862), and two additional species which are distributed in the Balkans, the region of Montenegro and Albania: V. mamillatus (Küster, 1852) and V. hellenicus (Clessin, 1879) in Greece. Zilch 1955: V. contectus = V. viviparus, V. viviparus = V. fasciatus), many old citations in the literature cannot be trusted (Glöer 2002). From Russia many more Viviparus spp. are listed, especially Viviparus sphaeridius (Bourguignat, 1880) (Starobogatov et al 2004, Kantor et al 2009). In the Danube near Marten, Bulgaria, Dilian Georgiev found topotypes of Viviparus sphaeridius Bourguignat, 1880 a Viviparus sp. This paper is intended to redescribe this species and to expand the knowledge of the mollusk fauna of Bulgaria and the Danubian region

Material and Methods

Results

Discussion