Papua New Guinea harbors one of the richest biotas in the world, with approximately 5 percent of the planet’s biodiversity. Yet many areas of the country are incompletely surveyed, especially for invertebrate animals like land snails.

Papustyla hindei (Cox 1888) New Britain, Nakanai Mountains NW of Pomio
Papustyla hindei (Cox 1888)
New Britain, Nakanai Mountains NW of Pomio

Unlike many other countries, Papua New Guinea retains much of its natural forest cover including the largest tracts of intact rainforest in Australasia. This combination of high diversity and low human impact provides unique opportunities to locate and describe biodiversity before significant impact, rather than identifying biota remaining in habitat patches as is unfortunately the case in many other parts of the world.

Our surveys of numerous sites throughout Papua New Guinea uncovered approximately 150 snail species that are new to science. This photo gallery includes some of these, as well as other snail species from Papua New Guinea. New photos will be added periodically, until all known species of terrestrial snails from Papua New Guinea are photographed, most for the first time.

Family: Assimineidae

Family: Camaenidae

Family: Charopidae

Family: Helicarionidae

Family: Pupinidae

Family: Rhytididae

Family: Trochomorphidae