''Ladislavella utahensis'', common name the thickshell pondsnail, 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

freshwater snail Freshwater snails are gastropod mollusks that live in fresh water. There are many different families. They are found throughout the world in various habitats, ranging from ephemeral pools to the largest lakes, and from small seeps and springs t ...

, an

aquatic Aquatic means relating to water; living in or near water or taking place in water; does not include groundwater, as "aquatic" implies an environment where plants and animals live. Aquatic(s) may also refer to: * Aquatic animal, either vertebrate ...

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 ...

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

in the family

Lymnaeidae Lymnaeidae, common name the pond snails, is a Taxonomy (biology), taxonomic family (biology), family of small to large air-breathing freshwater snails, Aquatic animal, aquatic pulmonate gastropod mollusks, that belong to the clade Hygrophila (cl ...

, the pond snails. 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 ...

Utah Lake Utah Lake is a shallow freshwater lake in the center of Utah County, Utah, United States. It lies in Utah Valley, surrounded by the Provo- Orem metropolitan area. The lake's only river outlet, the Jordan River, is a tributary of the Great Sa ...

in the United States. The last living snails were found in the early 1930s.

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 globose, somewhat umbilicated and irregularly costate. The color of the shell is light horn and nearly pellucid. 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 rather small and conical. The shell has from 4 to 4 and half convex

whorls A whorl ( or ) is an individual circle, oval, volution or equivalent in a whorled pattern, which consists of a spiral or multiple concentric objects (including circles, ovals and arcs). In nature File:Photograph and axial plane floral diagram ...

, that are somewhat flattened above, giving rather a shouldered appearance to the whorls. Whorls are rapidly increasing in size. The

last whorl The body whorl is part of the morphology of the shell in those gastropod mollusks that possess a coiled shell. The term is also sometimes used in a similar way to describe the shell of a cephalopod mollusk. In gastropods In gastropods, the b ...

is inflated, with numerous rather marked transverse costae and minutely wrinkled. The suture is somewhat deep, regularly impressed. 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 elongately ovate, effuse, approaching patulous and pearly white within. The outer lip is simple and its margin is connected by a slight calcareous deposit. The

columella Lucius Junius Moderatus Columella (, Arabic: ) was a prominent Roman writer on agriculture in the Roman Empire. His in twelve volumes has been completely preserved and forms an important source on Roman agriculture and ancient Roman cuisin ...

is somewhat twisted, but straight in front. The average width of the shell of ''Ladislavella utahensis'' is 7.10 mm. The average height of the shell is 13.40 mm. The maximum width of the shell is 8.88 mm. The height of the shell is 16.82 mm. The width of the aperture is 5.90 mm. The height of the apeture is 9.00 mm. File:Stagnicola utahensis shell 2.jpg, Drawing of apical view of the shell File:Stagnicola utahensis shell 3.jpg, Drawing of lateral view of the shell

Anatomy

The anatomy of the

radula The radula (; : radulae or radulas) is an anatomical structure used by mollusks for feeding, sometimes compared to a tongue. It is a minutely toothed, chitinous ribbon, which is typically used for scraping or cutting food before the food enters ...

was not published. (cf.)

Distribution

This species is

Utah Utah is a landlocked state in the Mountain states, Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It is one of the Four Corners states, sharing a border with Arizona, Colorado, and New Mexico. It also borders Wyoming to the northea ...

and it is known only from

. The type locality is

Lake Utah Utah Lake is a shallow freshwater lake in the center of Utah County, Utah, United States. It lies in Utah Valley, surrounded by the Provo-Orem metropolitan area. The lake's only river outlet, the Jordan River, is a tributary of the Great Salt La ...

Lehi, Utah Lehi ( ) is a city in Utah County, Utah, United States. The population was 75,907 at the 2020 United States Census, 2020 census, up from 47,407 in 2010, and it is the center of population of Utah. The rapid growth in Lehi is due, in part, to t ...

. The species was already considered "rare" in Utah Lake in the 1880s. The most recent living examples were found in 1933.

Ecology

This species was associated with abundant individuals of the snails ''

Valvata utahensis The Utah roundmouth snail, also known as the Utah valvata or desert valvata, scientific name ''Valvata utahensis'', is a species of freshwater snail with a gill and an operculum, an aquatic gastropod mollusc in the family Valvatidae, the valve sn ...

'' and ''

Fluminicola fusca ''Fluminicola'' may refer to: * ''Fluminicola'' (gastropod), a genus of minute freshwater snails in the family Lithoglyphidae * ''Fluminicola'' (fungus), a genus of fungi in the family Papulosaceae {{Genus disambiguation ...

'' and with the bivalve ''

Sphaerium dentatum ''Sphaerium'' is a genus of very small freshwater clams, aquatic bivalve molluscs in the family Sphaeriidae, known as the fingernail clams. The small clams in this genus are unusual in that many of them, such as ''Sphaerium corneum'', can climb a ...

''.

References

This article incorporates public domain text from reference Call R. E. (1886). "On certain recent, quaternary, and new fresh-water Mollusca". ''

Proceeding Davenport Academy of Natural Sciences In academia and librarianship, conference proceedings are a collection of academic papers published in the context of an academic conference or workshop. Conference proceedings typically contain the contributions made by researchers at the confere ...

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5page 5plate I
figure 7-9. {{Taxonbar, from=Q123194083, from2=Q3074461 Lymnaeidae Molluscs of North America Critically endangered fauna of North America Endemic fauna of Utah Gastropods described in 1884 Taxonomy articles created by Polbot