Spatiotemporal patterns of non-native terrestrial gastropods in the contiguous United States

By

Gladstone, Nicholas
Bordeau, Trystan
Leppanen, Christy J
McKinney, Michael

Type

Article

Date of Publication

2020

Original Publication

NeoBiota : advancing research on alien species and biological invasions

Volume

57

Pages

133--152

Subjects

Citizen science , data aggregation , invasive species , Land snails , non-native , slugs

Contributed by

Pensoft Publishers

Language

English

Published by

Sophia, Bulgaria Pensoft Publishers

Identifiers

DOI: https://doi.org/10.3897/neobiota.57.52195

 

Abstract

The contiguous United States (CONUS) harbor a significant non-native species diversity. However, spatiotemporal trends of some groups such as terrestrial gastropods (i.e., land snails and slugs) have not been comprehensively considered, and therefore management has been hindered. Here, our aims were to 1.) compile a dataset of all non-native terrestrial gastropod species with CONUS occurrence records, 2.) assess overarching spatiotemporal patterns associated with these records, 3.) describe the continental origin of each species, and 4.) compare climatic associations of each species in their indigenous and introduced CONUS ranges. We compiled a georeferenced dataset of 10,097 records for 22 families, 48 genera, and 69 species, with > 70% of records sourced from the citizen science database iNaturalist. The species Cornu aspersum Müller, 1774 was most prevalent with 3,672 records. The majority (> 92%) of records exhibit an indigenous Western European and Mediterranean distribution, with overlap in broad-scale climatic associations between indigenous and CONUS ranges. Records are most dense in urban metropolitan areas, with the highest proportion of records and species richness in the state of California. We show increased prevalence of non-native species through time, largely associated with urbanized areas with high human population density. Moreover, we show strong evidence for a role for analogous climates in dictating geographic fate and pervasiveness between indigenous and CONUS ranges for non-native species.