Ganula gadirana n. sp., a new Hygromiidae from southern Spain (Pulmonata: Helicoidea)

Abstract

Ganula gadirana Muñoz, Almodóvar & Arrébola, is proposed as a new species from the southernmost corner in the Iberian Peninsula. This species, sometimes erroneously recorded as Helix (= Ganula) lanuginosa Boissy, 1835, is characterized by a globose conical-depressed shell, with ovate aperture, small umbilicus, and periostracum with long, persistent hairs; it has a right ommatophore retractor between the penis and the vagina, a penial nerve arising from the right cerebral ganglion, ring-shaped glandular area on the distal penis wall, a fenestrate and elongate penial papilla, and a circumvaginal tuft of long, annulated digitiform glands. A dart-sac complex is on one side of the vagina and is formed by an outer dart-bearing stylophore and inner apically bilobed dartless stylophore; each open separately into a canaliculate deep groove that divides two large pleats, distally detached from the vaginal wall. Comparisons with Ichnusotricha and Ganula suggest that the new species may be closely related to G. Ianuginosa (Boissy, 1835). The bilobate distal portion of the inner stylophore, the larger number of tufts in the digitiform glands, the fenestrate penial papilla, the penial glandular area, and the radular formula to distinguish G. gadirana from G. Ianuginosa.