''Elona quimperiana'',

common name In biology, a common name of a taxon or organism (also known as a vernacular name, English name, colloquial name, country name, popular name, or farmer's name) is a name that is based on the normal language of everyday life; and is often con ...

the escargot de Quimper ("Quimper snail"), 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 Elonidae. ''Elona'' is a

monotypic genus In biology, a monotypic taxon is a taxonomic group (taxon) that contains only one immediately subordinate taxon. A monotypic species is one that does not include subspecies or smaller, infraspecific taxa. In the case of genera, the term "unispe ...

, i.e. it contains only one species, ''Elona quimperiana''. The specific name comes from the city of

Quimper Quimper (, ; ; or ) is a Communes of France, commune and Prefectures in France, prefecture of the Finistère Departments of France, department of Brittany (administrative region), Brittany in northwestern France. Administration Quimper is the ...

Brittany Brittany ( ) is a peninsula, historical country and cultural area in the north-west of modern France, covering the western part of what was known as Armorica in Roman Gaul. It became an Kingdom of Brittany, independent kingdom and then a Duch ...

, France. This snail is mentioned in annexes II and IV of the

Habitats Directive The Habitats Directive (more formally known as Council Directive 92/43/EEC on the Conservation of natural habitats and of wild fauna and flora) is a directive adopted by the European Community in 1992 as a response to the Berne Convention. The ...

Original description

''Elona quimperiana'' was originally described (under the name ''Helix quimperiana'') by André Étienne d'Audebert de Férussac in 1821. Férussac's original text (the type description) reads in the French language as follows: Which means in English: "Habitat: Margin of Briec (Briec-de-l'Odet) near

. It was found by

Messieurs ( ; ; pl. ; ; 1512, from Middle French , literally "my lord") is an honorific title that was used to refer to or address the eldest living brother of the king in the French royal court. It has now become the customary French title of respe ...

De Kermovan and Bonnemaison."

Shell description

The

shell Shell may refer to: Architecture and design * Shell (structure), a thin structure ** Concrete shell, a thin shell of concrete, usually with no interior columns or exterior buttresses Science Biology * Seashell, a hard outer layer of a marine ani ...

is umbilicate and planorboid in shape. The

spire A spire is a tall, slender, pointed structure on top of a roof of a building or tower, especially at the summit of church steeples. A spire may have a square, circular, or polygonal plan, with a roughly conical or pyramidal shape. Spire ...

is slightly concave. The periphery is broadly rounded, corneous with a few varicoid white stripes. The shell has five or six whorls. The

aperture In optics, the aperture of an optical system (including a system consisting of a single lens) is the hole or opening that primarily limits light propagated through the system. More specifically, the entrance pupil as the front side image o ...

is lunar and slightly oblique. The lip is white, expanded above, reflexed below, with the ends distant. The width of the shell is 20–30 mm. The height of the shell is 10–12 mm. Kerney M.P., Cameron R.A.D. & Jungbluth J.H. (1983). ''Die Landschnecken Nord- und Mitteleuropas.'' Hamburg/Berlin, 384 pp., page 242-243. File:Elona quimperiana shell.jpg, apical view File:Elona quimperiana shell 2.jpg, apertural view File:Elona quimperiana shell 3.jpg, umbilical view

Anatomy

The jaw has 11-16 narrow ribs. The anatomy of ''Elona quimperiana'' was described in detail by

Alfred Moquin-Tandon Christian Horace Benedict Alfred Moquin-Tandon (7 May 1804 – 15 April 1863) was a French Natural history, naturalist and doctor. Moquin-Tandon was professor of zoology at Marseille from 1829 until 1833, when he was appointed professor of botany ...

already in 1855-1856 and later by Gittenberger (1979).Gittenberger E. (1979). ''On Elona (Pulmonata, Eloniadae fam. nov.)'
Malacologia Volume 18, 1-2
Sixth European Malacological Congress, Amsterdam
139
145.

Reproductive system The reproductive system of an organism, also known as the genital system, is the biological system made up of all the anatomical organs involved in sexual reproduction. Many non-living substances such as fluids, hormones, and pheromones are al ...

: the genitalia have club-shaped mucous glands, in other words, the mucous glands are shortened into somewhat rounded triangular sacks. Mucous glands shaped like this are unusual in the

Helicoidea Helicoidea is a Taxonomy (biology), taxonomic Taxonomic rank, superfamily of air-breathing land snails, terrestrial molluscs, terrestrial pulmonate gastropod mollusks in the order (taxonomy), order Stylommatophora. Taxonomy 2017 taxonomy and l ...

, but are typical of the Elonidae. The dart sack is inserted in a sort of calyx at base. The

love dart A love dart (also known as a gypsobelum, shooting darts, or just as darts) is a sharp, calcium carbonate, calcareous or chitinous Dart (missile), dart which some hermaphroditic land snails and slugs create. Love darts are both formed and stor ...

is curved at the end, with lens-like section.
Drawing of reproductive system by Gittenberger 1979
)

Distribution

This species is found in France and Spain. The Lusitanian snail ''Elona quimperiana'' has a remarkably

disjunct distribution In biology, a taxon with a disjunct distribution is one that has two or more groups that are related but considerably separated from each other geographically. The causes are varied and might demonstrate either the expansion or contraction of a s ...

, limited to northwestern France (

), northwestern Spain and the Basque Country.

Habitat

This species lives in temperate and humid deciduous forests.

Life cycle

Like other pulmonates, snails and slugs, the Quimper snail is hermaphrodite. Sexual maturity is reached at about two years of age. Mating takes place at mid-season and laying, usually underground, is deposited in tiny natural tunnels of the soil. There are two annual breeding periods in Brittany, with hatching occurring in the spring (April–May) and in the fall (September–October).

Feeding habits

This species of snail feeds on mycelia found on rotten, dead stumps (principally oak). Occasionally, it is coprophagous and necrophagous. Like many other terrestrial gastropods, ''Elona quimperiana'' has a relatively limited dispersal capacity and probably survived during the Quaternary

glaciation A glacial period (alternatively glacial or glaciation) is an interval of time (thousands of years) within an ice age that is marked by colder temperatures and glacier advances. Interglacials, on the other hand, are periods of warmer climate be ...

s through significant fluctuations in its distribution area, just as its deciduous forest habitat did.

References

This article incorporates CC-BY-2.0 text (but not under

GFDL The GNU Free Documentation License (GNU FDL or GFDL) is a copyleft license for free documentation, designed by the Free Software Foundation (FSF) for the GNU Project. It is similar to the GNU General Public License, giving readers the rights ...

) from referenceVialatte A., Guiller A., Bellido A. & Madec L. (2008). "Phylogeography and historical demography of the Lusitanian snail ''Elona quimperiana'' reveal survival in unexpected separate glacial refugia". ''

BMC Evolutionary Biology ''BMC Ecology and Evolution'' (since January 2021), previously ''BMC Evolutionary Biology'' (2001–2020), is a peer-reviewed open access scientific journal covering all fields of evolutionary biology, including phylogenetics and palaeontology ...

'' 2008, 8:339. . and a public domain text from references. Tryon G. W. (1894). '' Manual of Conchology, structural and systematic, with illustrations of the species. Second series: Pulmonata''
Volume 9
Helicidae – Volume VII. Continued by H. A. Pilsbry
page 307
308.

External links

* https://web.archive.org/web/20090526180159/http://natura2000.environnement.gouv.fr/especes/1007.html#hautpage {{Taxonbar, from1=Q731889, from2=Q27986659 Elonidae Quimper Gastropods described in 1821 Taxonomy articles created by Polbot Habitats Directive species