Balea peregrina Gould, 1847

Brook, Fred J. & Ablett, Jonathan D., 2019, Type material of land snails (Mollusca: Gastropoda) described from New Zealand by taxonomists in Europe and North America between 1830 and 1934, and the history of research on the New Zealand land snail fauna from 1824 to 1917, Zootaxa 4697 (1), pp. 1-117 : 90

Balea peregrina Gould, 1847

Pl. 15, fig. F

Gould, 1847. Proceedings of the Boston Society of Natural History, 2: 198.

Type material: Syntype (1), USNM 5507 (dry shell material); specimen lost ( Johnson 1964: 125).

Type locality: Incorrectly stated as ‘New Zealand’ by Gould (1847: 198, 1852: 91).

Previous illustrations of type material: Gould (1856: pl. 7, fig. 105, a, b [reproduced here in pl. 15, fig. F]).

Remarks: The original species description was based on one or more specimens collected during the United States Exploring Expedition, reportedly from New Zealand ( Gould 1847, 1852). However, the description and illustrations of Balea peregrina indicate that it belongs in the Clausiliidae , which is not represented in the New Zealand fauna, and the type material was undoubtedly mis-localised. The apparent absence of apertural lamellae and plicae suggests that Gould’s species belongs in the subfamily Neniinae Wenz, 1923 , within Temesa H. & A. Adams, 1855 or Parabalea Ancey, 1882 . Species of these two genera are restricted to elevations of c. 3,100 —4,800 m in the Andes Mountains of South America (e.g., Pilsbry 1949; Neubert & Nordsieck 2005; Breure 2012). Temesa as interpreted by Nordsieck (2007, 2012) is known only from the Cajamarca Region of northern Peru, whereas Parabalea has a distribution extending from the Ancash Region of northern Peru to northwestern Bolivia, with highest diversity in the Junin Region of Peru. The type specimen of Balea peregrina was probably collected in May 1839, when ships of the United States Exploring Expedition were based in the port of Callao, Peru. During this visit a party from the expedition travelled inland up the valley of the ‘Rio de Caxavillo’ [= Rio Chillón] and over the Cordillera Occidental to a silver mine at Alpamarca [Junin Region], and thence to ‘Baños’ [= Pacaraos, Lima Region] on the western flank of the range, to make botanical collections (see Wilkes 1845: 253–276). It follows that the type material of B. peregrina probably came from the Cordillera Occidental in either the Lima or Junin regions, and thus probably belongs in Parabalea . The description and illustrations of Balea peregrina closely match Parabalea incarum (Pilsbry, 1926) , which has been recorded from elevations of c. 4,100 —4,800 m in the vicinity of Lake Junin ( Pilsbry 1949; Loosjes & Loosjes-van Bemmel 1984), and the two taxa may be conspecific.

Taxonomy: Treated here as Parabalea peregrina ( Gould, 1847) n. comb.

Distribution: Probably native to the Cordillera Occidental in the Lima or Junin regions of central Peru.