Vertigo moulinsiana (Dupuy) in Czechoslovakia

In Central Europe Vertigo moulinsiana (Dupuy) is one of the rare species and its scattered localities represent the relicts of a former far more abundant distribution in the Pleistocene and in the older Holocene. It often happens that relatively well preserved fossil shells are washed out by water from the beds in which they were deposited. Such finds may then easily mislead the collector, and make him assume that he has here a recent occurrence, and thus introduce a series of incorrect records into the literature. Therefore every verified recent occurrence of this zoogeographically remarkable gastropod is of importance. In this brief communication I wish to report on a new find of strong recent populations of Vertigo moulinsiana (Dupuy) in Slovakia and to add some remarks concerning its mode of life, and its distribution in Czechoslovakia and in the Carpathian basin. I wish to thank here most sincerely the Hungarian malacologists Professor L. Soós and J. Vágvölgyi for the detailed information they gave me concerning the occurrence of V. moulinsiana (Dupuy) in the region of the Carpathian basin. In June 1955, in my investigations in the vicinity of the village of Jasov, 20 km. west of the town of Košice in southeastern Slovakia, I discovered a rich recent population of the species Vertigo moulinsiana (Dupuy), which lives here abundantly in stands of Carices in the western part of the southern shore of the pond at the lower end of the valley of the stream Teplica. The locality lies on the bottom of this valley at an altitude of 269 m. above sea level. The valley of the Teplica forms the boundary between the South Slovakian Karst and the Slovak Ore Mountains. The limestones of the Karst form the southern slope of the valley, whose bottom and northern slope are formed by the crystalline schists of the Ore Mountains. About 1.5 km. farther west (i.e. upstream) a strong karst spring rises from the southern slope of the valley, called by the local inhabitants „Nagy forrás”, which supplies most of its water to the stream Teplica and to the ponds established on it. The flat bottom of the valley is entirely influenced by the calcareous waters of the karst spring, and is covered with marshy meadows with a strongly calcareous soil. In some ponds, turned into trout breeding ponds, thin layers of freshwater limestone are precipitated in the dense stands of Chara spec. div. The hills around the valley attain at its lower end 350 m., but towards the west they rise rapidly to more than 600 m., and are covered with continuous deciduous forests of a primary character.