Lauopa mbalavuana

[surroundx]

Cowie, Robert H., Régnier, Claire, Fontaine, Benoît, and Bouchet, Philippe. (2017). Measuring the Sixth Extinction: what do mollusks tell us? The Nautilus 131(1): 3-41.

[surroundx]

This species is known only from Vanua Balavu, in the northern Lau Group of Fiji. The area of this island, 52.5 km2, is taken as the maximum potential area in which the species could occur. The forests of Vanua Balavu have been significantly reduced in both extent and quality by human activities (Garnock-Jones 1978, Latham and Brookfield 1983, Bryan, E.H. in Evenhuis 2007, Franklin et al. 2008, Franklin and Steadman 2010). Estimates of ~50% loss in habitat derived from recent satellite imagery (Google Earth images 2006), indicates that the available potential habitat for the species is 26 km2. However, this area of potential habitat may be substantially less if the species is restricted to karst substrate, which only occurs over part of the island.

Nothing is known of the species' population trends. The species is known only from two dead shells (Solem 1983), discovered amongst a large series of land snail specimens collected by a Bishop Museum survey team in 1938 (Barker and Bouchet 2010). No live specimens have ever been sighted.

www.iucnredlist.org/species/195542/176540358#population