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Megalobulimus cf. maximus (G. B. Sowerby II, 1825) sensu Pilsbry, 1895 |
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São Miguel do Guamá, Pará, Brazil. Animal about 300 mm. (one foot)
in length. Photograph by Dr. José Leal in August, 1980.
This Megalobulimus had a shell approximately 150 mm in
height, but it was not collected. The shells of only a few members
of the genus attain that size, and, of them, the only one that has
been reported to occur anywhere near the locality where this snail
was photographed is M. maximus (G. B. Sowerby II, 1825),
typical specimens of which come from Bolivia and probably adjacent
parts of Brazil and Peru (Simone, 2006: 213). However Pilsbry (1895:
15) cited a specimen collected by Stübel in
Baião,
on the Rio Tocantins in the state of Pará, Brazil. It is probable
that Pilsbry examined the specimen. If the locality data provided by
Stübel is accurate, there is a reasonable likelihood that this
shell(s) belongs to the same species as the snail in the photograph.
Type figure of Bulinus
maximus (G. B. Sowerby I, 1825) in Sowerby and Sowerby, 1838:
part 138, pl. 71, fig. 63. Original description of this species (as Cochlogena maxima) from the "Tankerville Catalogue"
On the other hand, the likelihood of the same
Megalobulimus species occurring both in Bolivia and Pará, Brazil,
just south of the Amazon estuary, is not very high. |
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