Daedalochila uvulifera (Shuttleworth, 1852) Peninsula Liptooth In Pasco-Hernando, Counties

Pictured below (left to right) are Kurt Auffenberg and Harry Lee at the old Aripeka post office

    On March 24, 2007 Kurt Auffenberg, Ed Cavin, and Harry Lee searched Aripeka, at the Pasco-Hernando Co. line, for examples of a subspecies described as Polygyra uvulifera striata Pilsbry, 1940. The type material (including the holotype, ANSP 77543) was sent to the Academy of Natural Sciences, Philadelphia probably between 1895 and 1900 by its collector, George Pine, a New Jersey native then in his 60's. Pine was appointed the first postmaster of Aripeka in Feb., 1895. Dr. Pilsbry (1900: 108) remarked: "Mr. Pine sent numerous specimens of uvulifera from Hernando Co. which differ from the Long Key types [type locality of Shuttleworth's Helix uvulifera [see Daedalochila uvulifera (Shuttleworth, 1852) Peninsula Liptooth] in being strongly striate and smaller.... I do not know whether these occur with the variety [P. u. bicornuta ssp. nov. (p. 107)] or at separate stations." It appears that forty years later Pilsbry decided to name these smaller, striate specimens.

    After several hours of searching and interviewing locals, in the early-mid afternoon we finally discovered a small population of snails along the side of Old Dixie Highway from a few to over 100 meters from its intersection with SR 595. The shells closely match the description and illustrations of P. u. striata, which is now placed in the genus Daedalochila Beck, 1837 (Type Helix auriculata Say, 1818).

    Earlier in the day we discovered George Pine's Post Office, which was newly-restored after having been moved about a mile from its original location in Hernando Co. south to modern Aripeka, which is actually in Pasco Co. Appropriately, it is now sited next door to a modern U. S. P. S. facility. We found the snails about a half mile south of Postmaster Pine's workplace. In the absence of more detailed type locality data, these 13 snails are considered topotypes, and will be of considerable value in revising the systematics of this group of polygyrid land snails.

Aripeka, Florida History at <http://fivay.org/aripeka.html>.
Pilsbry, H. A., 1900. A new American land shell. The Nautilus 13(9): 107-108. Jan.
Pilsbry, H. A., 1940. Land Mollusca of North America north of Mexico vol I part 2. Academy of Natural Sciences, Philadelphia. vi + 575-994 + ix. Aug. 1.

Epilogue: After considerable study of dozens of lots assigned to D. uvulifera (Shuttleworth, 1852) sensu stricto, Dr. Lee concluded that there was no taxonomically significant difference among the shells of these topotypes, the type suite of D. u. striata at the Academy of Natural Sciences, Philadelphia, and the many nominotypical D. uvulifera. D. uvulifera striata is therefore considered a synonym of D. uvulifera.

Daedalochila uvulifera striata (Pilsbry, 1940) Topotypes

Aripeka historical marker

Old Dixie Highway where the snails were found