Biogeographia – The Journal of Integrative Biogeography

Pomacea canaliculata (Caenogastropoda: Ampullariidae) is a freshwater snail native to the lower Del Plata basin in South America. However, along with other species collectively known as “apple snails”, it has been introduced to many regions outside its natural range. In these areas, it has spread rapidly, causing extensive damage to aquatic crops and adversely affecting the biodiversity and ecological functioning of natural wetlands. This publication aims to present an updated, accurate, and open-access database of P. canaliculata occurrence records worldwide. The database is intended to support ecological studies and pest management initiatives, with a particular emphasis on distinguishing P. canaliculata from other apple snail species to prevent misidentifications. It compiles all reliable records of P. canaliculata from both its native and invaded ranges, offering comprehensive coverage of its global distribution. The result is a dataset of 718 records from 29 countries across Africa, South America, North America, Asia, and the Pacific Islands, reported from the early 20th century to the present. This occurrence dataset is now included in the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF), hosted by the “Ministerio de Ciencia, Tecnología e Innovación Productiva” under the publisher “Instituto de Ciencias Biológicas y Biomédicas del Sur (INBIOSUR)”.

Areas of endemism are defined as regions where two or more species share congruent distributions, representing primary homologies in historical biogeography. These areas are critical for conservation efforts. This study identified areas of endemism in Paraguay using an endemicity analysis (EA) with NDM/VNDM software, based on 2,587 records of 106 plant species. We used grids of 0.5° and 0.6° latitude and longitude to evaluate the stability of these areas across different spatial scales. Sixty areas of endemism were identified and grouped into seven consensus areas. Two of these areas, located in the Dry Chaco and the Alto Paraná Atlantic Forest (BAAPA), were consistent across both scales. No endemism areas were found in the Humid Chaco or Pantanal regions. In the Cerrado, two consensus areas overlapped with those of the BAAPA. Additionally, a consensus area was identified in the Cordillera de los Altos and the southern BAAPA region, highlighting a biogeographic transition and the ecotonal nature of the area.

Microscopic terrestrial invertebrates, such as tardigrades and nematodes, have been historically understudied and misunderstood. Terrestrial habitats of tardigrades and nematodes, like moss and lichens, have been sparingly identified throughout scientific and natural history. Additionally, many regions within the United States have little-to-no records of tardigrade and nematode taxa from moss and lichens. In the current study, we collected moss, lichen, and liverwort samples from multiple state parks and areas within Southwest Wisconsin to investigate tardigrade and nematode communities. Generalized Linear Models confirmed that habitat species, substrate, site location, and elevation had a significant effect on tardigrade and nematode abundances. We also report significant associations of certain tardigrade and nematode taxa with their respective cryptogam habitats. Furthermore, we report a new distribution of the heterotardigrade species Viridiscus aff. perviridis and Viridiscus viridissimus, and the eutardigrade species Minibiotus cf. jonesorum to the state of Wisconsin. Our study indicates that many tardigrade and nematode associations with cryptogam habitats have yet to be explored and documented in North America.

Mountains are estimated to harbor the highest diversity in many taxonomic groups. However, patterns of elevational distributions and their underlying explanatory environmental variables have not been well studied in amphibians. We explore elevational patterns of species richness in amphibians and evaluate seven environmental models that may explain such patterns. We also test how the spatial scale of elevational bands affects the perceived patterns and the power of the explanatory variables. We utilize records from the most comprehensive amphibian database of Mexico. Gradients were selected across five Mexican mountain ranges, for both coastal and continental slopes, according to four criteria that allowed for standardization. Species richness-elevation relationships were classified into five patterns as described in the literature. Generalized linear models were applied to test six models, which include temperature, precipitation, water-energy dynamics, topographic heterogeneity (TH), their interaction and area. Species richness and environmental factors for each model and each gradient were calculated at four spatial scales of elevational bands (100, 200, 300, and 500 m). A total of 20 gradients were evaluated, for which all five patterns of species richness reported in literature were observed at least once. The pattern of mid-peak richness was the most commonly observed, followed by a decreasing pattern of richness with elevation. The water-energy dynamic was the best model at smaller spatial scales, while temperature, TH and area, became increasingly important in explaining richness patterns as the spatial scale increased. The elevational distribution of species richness in amphibians showed similar tendencies as in literature. This study demonstrated a larger variation in the power of explanatory variables between mountain ranges than between spatial scales. In general, the proportion of variance explained was high, showing that the chosen explanatory environmental variables are important in structuring the elevational patterns.

Specimens deposited in Natural History Museum collections are vital for the study of biodiversity, human drivers of biodiversity loss, and other environmental and socioeconomic problems. Despite recent advances in filling our knowledge gaps regarding the myrmecofauna of Cyprus, the island’s biodiversity is considered to be under-sampled. In this article, ant specimens from Cyprus deposited at the Natural History Museums of Crete, the Agricultural University of Athens (Greece), the Muséum d'Histoire Naturelle de Genève (Switzerland), the Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences (Belgium), and the Lund University Biological Museum (Sweden) are examined, presenting a total of 163 specimens belonging to 24 species examined. Stigmatomma denticulatum Roger, 1859 (Amblyoponinae), Myrmecina graminicola (Latreille, 1802), Stenamma debile (Foerster, 1850) (Myrmicinae), and Cryptopone ochracea (Mayr, 1855) (Ponerinae) are reported for the first time for the island of Cyprus, raising its known ant diversity from 77 to 81 species, while additional distributional data are given for species with only a handful of distributional records, i.e. Tapinoma festae Emery, 1925 (Dolichoderinae), Aphaenogaster subterraneoides Emery, 1881 (Myrmicinae), and Hypoponera eduardi (Forel, 1894) (Ponerinae).