WELCH : RARE OR LOCAL IRISH MOI.LUSCA. I9 



toriiin has its head-quarters in the little coast glens of north-east 

 Antrim, where it sometimes swarms all over the nettles and brambles 

 in damp weather. It is also plentiful at Glencar, in north Leitrim, 

 and is recorded from one station each in Derry, Armagh, and West- 

 meath. A Limerick record seems to me rather doubtful, and I have 

 failed to verify a Killarney one. 



Vertigo pusilla has been found in six stations on the north-east and 

 west coasts of Ulster. At three of these it is moderately plentiful in 

 shell pockets in the dunes, at Portstewart, Narin, and Bundoran. It 

 has also been found sparingly in Co. Dublin, north Tipperary, Clare, 

 Limerick, Cork, and Kerry, so that it is fairly generally distributed, 

 but with one exception always on or near the coast. 



There is one other species, a few years ago considered extremely 

 local and rare, that I desire to call attention to, as it seems to have 

 been at one time more abundant than at present, though smaller in 

 size — Planorbis glaher. This species is plentiful in many localities in 

 shell-marls from under peat-bogs, with Planorbis crista, and I have 

 records now from seventeen stations, but none from the south-east 

 corner of Ireland, either living or from marl-deposits. The living 

 specimens from ponds at Belfast Mr. Lionel E. Adams states are 

 the finest he has seen. 



Planorbis vortex and P. carinatus seem plentiful only along the 

 north-west margin of the central plain. The first seems absent in the 

 north-east, replaced by P. spirorbis, and I know of only one north 

 east habitat for really typical P. carinatus. 



Six species, either strictly maritime, or nearly so in other parts of 

 the country, occur far inland on the central limestone plain. These 

 are Helix virgata, H. intersecta, H, ericetorum, H. acuta, H. piilchella, 

 and Pupa muscorum, the latter very rare as a rule. 



Physa acuta Drap. at Kew Gardens. — In my friend, Mr. Pannell's interest- 

 ing Surrey records, this species is entered to my name in such wise as to make it 

 appear that he supposes me to be its first discoverer at Kew {J. of Conch., vol. 10, 

 p. 333, July 1903). I had no intention of creating such an impression on his mind. 

 The mollusk has been known, evidently in the same tank, for more than forty years. 

 I quote the following from Mr. J. Gwyn Jeffreys ("British Conch.," vol. i, p. 100, 

 1862) : " Mr. Choules has described in the '■Zoologist'' a species of Physa, which he 

 found in a water-tank in Kew Gardens, and which Mr. Norman (being misinformed 

 as to the precise locality) has proposed to admit into our native fauna. It appears 

 to be a variety of the P. acuta of Draparnaud, but it is indistinguishable from speci- 

 mens in the British Museum which were collected in Cuba, St. Thomas, and St. 

 Croix, and it has probably been introduced with some aquatic tropical plant." See 

 also, for recent notices, Mr. Lionel E. Adams ("Collectors' Manual," ed. 2, Intro- 

 duction, p. 18) ; and Messrs. Williams, Taylor and Roebuck (" Land and Freshwater 

 Shells," Yoimg Collectors'' Series, ed. 3, p. 69).— William Whitwell {Read before 

 the Society, Sept. 9th, 1903). 



