Fukuia

Fukuia
A live individual of Fukuia multistriata
Scientific classification
Kingdom:
Animalia
Phylum:
Mollusca
Class:
Gastropoda
(unranked):
clade Caenogastropoda
clade Hypsogastropoda
clade Littorinimorpha
Superfamily:
Rissooidea
Family:
Pomatiopsidae
Subfamily:
Pomatiopsinae
Genus:
Fukuia

Abbott & Hunter, 1949[1]
Diversity[2]
3 species and "Fukuia" ooyagii

Fukuia is a genus of amphibious freshwater snails and land snails with an operculum, gastropod mollusks in the family Pomatiopsidae.

Distribution

The genus Fukuia is endemic to Honshu, Japan.[2] These snails occur especially in the northern and western part of Japan, on the coast of the Sea of Japan.[2] There is a unique climate in the Sea of Japan with high precipitation due to winter snowfall in the area of distribution of Fukuia.[2] These snails have been described as a "Japan Sea element".[2]

Map showing hypothesized paleodistribution of the genus Fukuia (Fukuia integra, Fukuia kurodai and Fukuia multistriata) in the Early Miocene (23-18 Ma).
Map showing hypothesized paleodistribution of the genus Fukuia in the Middle Pliocene to Late Pliocene (3.5-2 Ma).

Species

Species within the genus Fukuia include:

The speciation of genus Fukuia likely started around 7.2 million years ago in the Late Miocene.[2]

Unassigned to genus:

  • Fukuia ooyagii Minato, 1982 - Aquatic species Fukuia ooyagii should be separated from Fukuia, and its generic assignment should be determined coupled with the investigation of its soft-part morphology.[2]

Ecology

Fukuia kurodai and Fukuia multistriata live amphibiously around rocky walls of steep valleys covered with ferns and bryophytes, and moistened by dripping water.[2] They live only along the mountain streamlets where such habitats are typically found, and often occur with pleurocerid freshwater snails.[2]

Fukuia integra lives as a terrestrial snail in inland forests.[2]

References

This article incorporates CC-BY-2.0 text from the reference[2]

  1. ^ Abbott & Hunter (1949). Proc. helminth. Soc. Wash. 16: 79.
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p Kameda Y. & Kato M. (2011). "Terrestrial invasion of pomatiopsid gastropods in the heavy-snow region of the Japanese Archipelago". BMC Evolutionary Biology 11: 118. doi:10.1186/1471-2148-11-118.
  3. ^ Davis G. M. (1979). "The origin and evolution of the gastropod family Pomatiopsidae, with emphasis on the Mekong river Triculinae". Academy of natural Sciences of Philadelphia, Monograph 20: 1-120. at Google books.
  • Media related to Fukuia at Wikimedia Commons