Partula taeniata

The tree snail

Partula taeniata is a tree snail in the family Partulidae (order Stylommatophora).

Range and habitat

It is endemic to French Polynesia.

Pins are Wikidata “endemic to” fields. Orange dots, when present, are GBIF occurrence tiles — survey bias included.

Diet

Partula snails graze micro-algae and fungi on leaves at night. They do not recover once a predator snail is established on the island.

Snails move on a single foot and feed with a rasping tongue. Island and spring species rarely recolonise once the site is emptied.

In crisis

This species was considered to be extinct in the wild, but intensive field surveys have recently detected surviving wild populations. The species is listed as Critically Endangered in the 2022 and 2024 IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. Previously it was incorrectly listed as extinct on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species from 1988 to 1994 and as Extinct in the wild in the 1996 IUCN Red List, before being corrected to Critically Endangered in 2009, although two subspecies survive in captivity and one still exists in the wild.

In 2010, a single Partula taeniata spp. Simulans was transferred to the Edinburgh Zoo. The subspecies now has several hundred individuals surviving in captivity.

The rosy wolfsnail and habitat clearing are the documented wrecking ball for Partula on Pacific islands.

Partula taeniata is Critically Endangered on this catalog because that is the IUCN category stored on Wikidata. Confirm the official criteria and any later count on iucnredlist.org.

Sources

Written for this catalog from the English Wikipedia article on Partula taeniata, Wikidata item Q1949425. Family and order context is original field-guide writing about the group, not a copied assessment of this one species. Wikipedia text is CC BY-SA. Not an IUCN assessment. Counts, when quoted, can change — confirm them on the recovery programme and on iucnredlist.org.