Philomycidae

Philomycidae are a family of air-breathing land slugs (snails without shells or with only shell remnants). They are terrestrial pulmonate gastropod mollusks in the superfamily Arionoidea (according to the taxonomy of the Gastropoda by Bouchet & Rocroi, 2005).

Philomycidae
A live individual of Megapallifera mutabilis in the wild
Scientific classification
Kingdom:
Animalia
Phylum:
Mollusca
Class:
Gastropoda
(unranked):
clade Heterobranchia
clade Euthyneura
clade Panpulmonata
clade Eupulmonata
clade Stylommatophora
informal group Sigmurethra
Superfamily:
Arionoidea
Family:
Philomycidae

Gray, 1847[1]
Genera

See text

Synonyms

Tebennophoridae Morse, 1864

A live individual of Meghimatium fruhstorferi in the wild

The family Philomycidae has no subfamilies.

Distribution

Slugs in this family are found in China, Japan, the East Indies, central and eastern North America, and through Central America into northern South America.

Anatomy

Members of this family most obviously differ from related slugs in that their mantles are broadly rounded, and very large, covering the entire body. (In mollusks, the mantle consists of the tissues that normally generate the shell. Being mostly or entirely without shells, most slugs have reduced mantles.)

Pilsbry (1948) stated that "the enormously developed mantle, the large empty shell sac, and the insertions of the free retractor muscles along the margins of the foot cavity, instead of dorsally as in the Arionidae are special to the Philomycidae".[2]

A further anatomical oddity of the group, shared with certain helicid and zonitid snails, is their creation and use of calcareous love darts during mating.[2][3]

In this family, the number of haploid chromosomes lies between 21 and 30 (according to the values in this table).[4]

Genera

Genera within the family Philomycidae include:

Cladogram

A cladogram based on sequences of cytochrome-c oxidase I (COI) genes showing phylogenic relations of genera in the family Philomycidae by Tsai & Wu (2008)[5] (simplified):

 
 
 
 

 Meghimatium 

 
 
 
 
 
 

 Philomycus 

 
 

 Pallifera 

 
 
 

 Megapallifera 

 
 
 

 Arion 

 
 
 
 
 

 Deroceras 

 
 
 

Arion and Deroceras were used as outgroup.[5]

References
  1. Gray J. E. (November 1847). A list of genera of Recent Mollusca, their synonyma and types. Proceedings of the Zoological Society of London, 15: 129-182. Philomycidae is on the page 170.
  2. Pilsbry H. A. (1948). "Land Mollusca of North America (North of Mexico)". Acad. Nat. Sci. Philadelphia, Monograph 3, 2(2): 748-750.
  3. Örstan A. (2005). "The dissection selection: Philomycus carolinianus". Snail's Tales.
  4. Barker G. M. (2001). Gastropods on Land: Phylogeny, Diversity and Adaptive Morphology. in Barker G. M. (ed.): The biology of terrestrial molluscs. CABI Publishing, Oxon, UK, 2001, ISBN 0-85199-318-4. 1-146, cited pages: 139 and 142.
  5. Tsai C.-L. & Wu S.-K. (2008). "A New Meghimatium Slug (Pulmonata: Philomycidae) from Taiwan". Zoological Studies 47(6): 759-766. PDF.
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