''Iberus gualtieranus'' is a

species A species () is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriate sexes or mating types can produce fertile offspring, typically by sexual reproduction. It is the basic unit of Taxonomy (biology), ...

of air-breathing

land snail A land snail is any of the numerous species of snail that live on land, as opposed to the sea snails and freshwater snails. ''Land snail'' is the common name for terrestrial molluscs, terrestrial gastropod mollusks that have gastropod shell, shel ...

, a terrestrial

pulmonate Pulmonata or pulmonates is an informal group (previously an order, and before that, a subclass) of snails and slugs characterized by the ability to breathe air, by virtue of having a pallial lung instead of a gill, or gills. The group inclu ...

gastropod Gastropods (), commonly known as slugs and snails, belong to a large Taxonomy (biology), taxonomic class of invertebrates within the phylum Mollusca called Gastropoda (). This class comprises snails and slugs from saltwater, freshwater, and fro ...

mollusk Mollusca is a phylum of protostomic invertebrate animals, whose members are known as molluscs or mollusks (). Around 76,000 extant species of molluscs are recognized, making it the second-largest animal phylum after Arthropoda. The ...

in the family

Helicidae Helicidae is a large, diverse family of western Palaearctic, medium to large-sized, air-breathing land snails, sometimes called the "typical snails." It includes some of the largest European land snails, several species are common in anthropoge ...

, the typical snails. ''Iberus gualtieranus'' is the

type species In International_Code_of_Zoological_Nomenclature, zoological nomenclature, a type species (''species typica'') is the species name with which the name of a genus or subgenus is considered to be permanently taxonomically associated, i.e., the spe ...

of the genus ''Iberus''."Genus summary for ''Iberus ''"

AnimalBase AnimalBase is a project brought to life in 2004 and is maintained by the University of Göttingen, Germany. The goal of the AnimalBase project is to digitize early zoological literature, provide copyright-free open access to zoological works, and p ...

, last modified 19 February 2008, accessed 26 June 2011. This species is

endemic Endemism is the state of a species being found only in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also foun ...

to the southeastern

Iberian Peninsula The Iberian Peninsula ( ), also known as Iberia, is a peninsula in south-western Europe. Mostly separated from the rest of the European landmass by the Pyrenees, it includes the territories of peninsular Spain and Continental Portugal, comprisin ...

Spain Spain, or the Kingdom of Spain, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe with territories in North Africa. Featuring the Punta de Tarifa, southernmost point of continental Europe, it is the largest country in Southern Eur ...

Subspecies

Sometimes up to seven

subspecies In Taxonomy (biology), biological classification, subspecies (: subspecies) is a rank below species, used for populations that live in different areas and vary in size, shape, or other physical characteristics (Morphology (biology), morpholog ...

are recognized: However, other studies consider '' Iberus alonensis'', '' Iberus campesinus'', and ''

Iberus carthaginiensis ''Iberus'' is a genus of air-breathing land snails, terrestrial pulmonate gastropod mollusks in the subfamily Helicinae of the family Helicidae.MolluscaBase eds. (2021). MolluscaBase. Iberus Montfort, 1810. Accessed through: World Register of Ma ...

'' as full species, explicitly recognizing only the following subspecies (''Iberus gualtieranus'' ''

sensu stricto ''Sensu'' is a Latin word meaning "in the sense of". It is used in a number of fields including biology, geology, linguistics, semiotics, and law. Commonly it refers to how strictly or loosely an expression is used in describing any particular c ...

''): * ''Iberus gualtieranus gualterianus'' * ''Iberus gualtieranus mariae'' * ''Iberus gualtieranus ornatissimus'' The latter is the classification followed by

IUCN The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) is an international organization working in the field of nature conservation and sustainable use of natural resources. Founded in 1948, IUCN has become the global authority on the status ...

Shell description

The shell is keeled and flattened, with marked ornamentation of spiral and radial costulae. In contrast, ''Iberus alonensis'' and ''Iberus campesinus'' have more rounded shells.

Habitat

''Iberus gualtieranus'' occurs in limestone mountain areas of rocky substrate and sun exposure sub-desert environments with sparse vegetation. It sometimes also occurs in areas with more vegetation cover. It is primarily active in spring and specially in autumn, when it is not too cold nor too hot and dry.

Conservation

''Iberus gualtieranus'' is threatened by fires and by road construction that fragments its habitat. It is also collected for human consumption and has a high market value, encouraging collection despite its rarity.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Iberus Gualtieranus gualtieranus Gastropods of Europe Endemic fauna of Spain Gastropods described in 1758 Taxa named by Carl Linnaeus Taxonomy articles created by Polbot