Email: Heike.Reise[/at/]senckenberg.de
Tel.: (+49) (3581) 47605410
Fax: (+49) (3581) 47605499 (please announce by phone or email)
Address for post:
Dr Heike Reise, Senckenberg Museum für Naturkunde Görlitz, Am Museum 1, 02826 Görlitz, GERMANY
Currently much of my time is taken up as an editor of the journal Archiv für Molluskenkunde, the oldest continuously running malacological journal. Back to Contents
Another approach that we are taking is to observe the mating behaviour of species in which particular parts of the penial morphology are unusually developed. For instance, Reise et al. (2007) consider whether the spectacularly branched penial gland of D. gorgonium is associated with unusual mating behaviour in this species.
Another reason for examining mating behaviour is to provide extra characters for taxonomy. For example, by studying the mating behaviour of Deroceras collected in the Sächsische Schweiz, we have recognised that D. rodnae needs to be split into at least two species with very different courtship and copulation behaviours (link to paper and videos). Another example is our discovery that the mating behaviour of the widespread pest species formerly known as D. panormitanum does not correspond to that of the species originally described under this name, prompting us to redescribe the pest species as Deroceras invadens (link to videos). Most recently it was the distinctive mating behaviour of Deroceras cecconii that made us realise that this long-ignored species really was valid; it turns out to be rather common and widespread in Italy. Observations of its mating behaviour was valuable also in establishing homologies between the functionally important parts of its penis and those of related species.
Our observations of mating behaviour have been much facilitated by the development of a digital video system based on security systems.
In the Elbsandsteingebirge south of Dresden D. rodnae co-occurs with D. juranum, but they have a very narrow parapatric distribution, seeming not to correspond with any landscape features. These two species are closely related but never hybridise. Back to Contents
I helped to write up recent discoveries in Romania of the pest slug A. vulgaris. Our paper reviews occurrences elsewhere in SE Europe. In contrast, collections by Turkish colleagues of similar looking slugs from Istanbul turned out to be an invasion of Arion ater agg. Back to Contents
We have since measured allometry of various components of the reproductive system of the terrestrial snail Helix pomatia and the freshwater basommatophorans Stagnicola corvus and Stagnicola turricula. This was in collaboration with Bartek Gołdyn and Tereza Kořínková. Back to Contents