Introduction

Materials and methods

Sampling

Sampling of land snails was carried out between 4 and 8 November 2021 by five malacologists (LM, KV, KP, MM and KAT) at 22 localities (Fig. 1, Suppl. material 1). We collected samples from a great spectrum of ecosystems, including shrublands (phrygana, maquis or mixed), oak forests, riparian vegetation around streams, cultivations, urban and peri-urban areas. Moreover, we gathered soil and litter under various plants. The collected live specimens were drowned in water and then preserved in 75% ethanol. Some of the individuals were also preserved in 96% ethanol for future molecular analyses. In the laboratory, the collected litter and soil were left to dry and then sieved. A 5-level test sieve was used (with mesh sizes of 5, 2.5, 1.7, 1 and 0.5 mm). Material passing through the 0.5 mm mesh was discarded, while the material obtained from each sieve was examined for small snails under a magnifying lens and good lighting. Shell morphology and reproductive systems were studied to perform identification at the species-level. The entire material collected is deposited in the malacological collection of the Natural History Museum of Crete (NHMC). Additionally, in order to supplement our recovered species list with species potentially not found, but reported in previous works, we re-examined material stored in the malacological collection of NHMC. Previous works reporting snails from the island (Fuchs and Käufel 1934, Fuchs and Käufel 1936, Mylonas 1982, Riedel 1992, Wiktor 2001) were also consulted for distributional data.

Figure 1.  

Map of Kea, the island’s location in the Aegean archipelago (Greece) and the 22 localities sampled for land snails shown with a triangle.

Analysis

Discussion

Acknowledgements

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Supplementary material