Book review

Our colleague Brian Smith, formerly of the Museum of Victoria, has pulled off a tour de force by producing a detailed catalogue of the non-marine molluscs of Australia (including some outlying islands groups such as Lord Howe, Norfolk, Christmas, Macquarie Is., etc.). The volume deals with 57 families, 400 genera and more than 1,000 species, but the author states on p. 1 that “about 30-40% of the non-marine fauna remains to be described”; this implies that Smith recognizes a maximum of 1,300-1,400 species in the area. This supplies valuable data in the context of modern conservation-oriented biodiversity studies. A book that starts with supplying such important and interesting details, even on its first page, is promising indeed. It is a sad fact that a number of Australian snails are aliens; more than 40 species in 18 families of the pulmonates have been imported since the arrival of the white man. Many are pest species in agriculture and horticulture. Fortunately, Smith treats them all.