Pregnant creature — with smooth and thin shell — found as new species in China stream
In the mountainous streams of southeastern China, a mother-to-be holds on to the rocky substrate as water flows over her shell.
The animal is about one inch long and protected by a whorled casing that covers her soft body.
She is a gastropod — the family that includes snails, slugs and whelks — and was recently discovered as a new species.
Semisulcospira egretta, named after the city bird of Xiamen, the egret, was discovered by researchers in a stream during a survey of gastropods in the genus, according to a study published Jan. 2 in the peer-reviewed journal Zoosystematics and Evolution.
Researchers exclusively found females, including one pregnant with as many as 150 embryos, according to the study.
The animal’s shell is “yellow-brownish” in color, researchers said. The shell is “smooth” and “thin” and has between seven and nine whorls.
The animal held within the shell has a black snout, neck and foot structure extending from the shell, with “golden spots on (the) tentacles,” according to the study.
Researchers used DNA to confirm the animal as a new species.
Gastropods are a class of mollusks that inhabit a wide variety of habitats around the world. There are ocean gastropods found in the deep sea, saltwater gastropods on coral reefs, freshwater gastropods in lakes, ponds and rivers, and even gastropods that live entirely on land or in tropical rainforests, according to Britannica.
There are more than 36 species in the Semisulcospira genus, including 18 in Lake Biwa in Japan, according to the study.
About 10 species in the genus have been identified in China, with one other identified in Fujian Province.
The new species was found in Xiamen, on the southeastern coast of China.
The research team includes Yi-Bin Xu, Yuan-Zheng Meng, Sheng Zeng, Hang-Jun Wang, Shen Zhong, De-Yuan Yang, Xi-Ping Zhou and Christopher J. Glasby.