Fukuia Abbott & Hunter 1949

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:

• Fukuia integra (Pilsbry, 1924) - synonym: Blanfordia integra Pilsbry, 1924, terrestrial^[2]
• Fukuia kurodai Abbott & Hunter, 1949 - type species,^[3] amphibious^[2]
  • Fukuia kurodai kurodai Abbott & Hunter, 1949^[2]
  • Fukuia kurodai niigataensis Minato, 1973^[2]
• Fukuia multistriata Abbott & Hunter, 1949 - amphibious^[2]

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]