The land snails (Mollusca, Gastropoda) of Kea island (Aegean, Greece)

Abstract

Kea is the westernmost island of the Cyclades and is located between Syros and Attica, in central Greece. In this work, we have resampled the island after 43 years – i.e. when the island was first fully sampled – and we present its complete land snail fauna.We report 42 land snail species with 10 species being new records for the island. Based on our results we draw attention to the fact that sampling for land snails should be done during the wet period in order to survey the complete malacofauna in an island or a region. For such a complete survey, collection and inspection of soil and litter are also necessary. Finally, increased sampling effort through regular resurveys is a necessary prerequisite in order to effectively assess the temporal dynamics of biodiversity patterns.

Keywords

• Aegean archipelago
• biodiversity
• land molluscs
• t