Sinployea ohinepoutea Climo, Mahlfeld & Roscoe, 2025

Mahlfeld, Karin, Climo, Frank & Roscoe, David, 2025, Systematics, conservation status, and biogeography of 16 new species of Sinployea Solem, 1983 (Gastropoda: Charopidae) from New Zealand, Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society 204 (1) : -

Sinployea ohinepoutea Climo, Mahlfeld & Roscoe sp. nov.

( Figs 16, 29, 44) Sinployea ‘Ohinepoutea’ McGuinness 2001: 595; Hitchmough (2002: 130).

Charopidae sp. 198 (NMNZ M.078239) Hitchmough et al. 2007: 131; Mahlfeld et al. 2012: appendix 1.

Material examined: New Zealand, North Island , East Cape, NMNZ: M.078239, holotype ( Fig.29), Hikurangi, WofRuatoria, Ohinepoutea Station, 37°51′07.268″S, 178°05′44.689″E, F.M. Climo, 12 May 1983 .

Other material: New Zealand, North Island, Northland, NMNZ: M.165180, S of Kaeo, Puketi Forest , 35°12′33.920″S, 173°47′37.970″E, P.C. Mayhill, July 1996 .

Description: Shell small, thin, and fragile, 1.95 mm wide and 0.93 mm high at approximately three whorls, moderately coarsely ribbed, loosely coiled, with a broadly flat spire. Umbilicus is ~470 μm wide (D/U ratio 4.15). Colour pattern consists of broad, irregular, brown flammulations and smaller translucent white patches, and a chiefly brown base. Protoconch of 1.25 convex whorls, translucent white, 491 μm wide, sculptured with five thin, widely spaced, spiral lirae. Teleoconch of ~1.75 rapidly expanding, convex whorls, base slightly flattened. Sculpture consisting of calcareous, thin, primary axials traversed by fine spiral lirae; spirals approximately one-third of the width of primary axials and forming microscopic beads at intersections with even finer secondary axials, about six to eight per interstitial space. First teleoconch whorl with 59 primary axials, each crested with a very fine periostracal lamella, which is often worn off. Suture deep. Aperture lunate; columella oblique and a little reflected; lip simple.

Reproductive anatomy: Unknown.

Etymology: Named after the farmstead near the type locality (~ 20 km W of Ruatoria, East Coast).

Distribution: New Zealand North Island: Northland, Puketi; East Coast: Ruatoria.

Ecology: Subtropical mixed broadleaf forest.

Related species: The combination of flat spire, loose coiling, moderately (for the group of northern Sinployea species) open umbilicus, dorsal colour pattern of brown, irregular flammulations, and brown base with a light patch around the umbilicus, plus a medium coarsely ribbed teleoconch differentiate this species from other NZ Sinployea species.

Conservation status: Revision of collection material found a second specimen from Puketi Forest, S of Kaeo, eastern Northland. Puketi Forest is ~ 490 km from the only other known locality in East Coast. Twenty-nine collections from Puketi were checked, and 93 sampling records from elsewhere on topographic NZ Map 260 sheet P05, 19 samples from map sheet Y15, and 34 from Y16 and Y17. A total of 289 sampling records within an area of 6000 km 2 of map sheets of the East Coast, X14, X15, X16, X17, Y14, Y15, Y16, Y17, Z14, Z15, Z16, and Z17 (based on Te Papa collection), were also checked ( Fig. 2). To our knowledge, the species has not been re-collected from the East Coast area since the mid-1980s and not from eastern Northland since the mid-1990s. On existing data, S. ohinepoutea has an eastern disjunctive range. Considering that there is little overlap in the distributions of Sinployea species, it is reasonable to assume that this species is probably also ‘At Risk: Naturally Uncommon’, with the qualifiers ‘Data Poor: Size and Trend’ and ‘Biological Sparse’. The 2010 NZTCS assessment ranked S. ohinepoutea as ‘Insufficient Information: Data Deficient’, with the qualifier ‘One Locality’.