Zilchogyra paulistana ( Hylton Scott, 1973 )

Salvador, Rodrigo B., Silva, Fernanda S., Cavallari, Daniel C., Cunha, Carlo M. & Bichuette, Maria E., 2022, Cave-dwelling gastropods (Mollusca: Gastropoda) of Brazil: state of the art and conservation, Zoologia (e 21033) 39, pp. 1-10 : 4

Zilchogyra paulistana ( Hylton Scott, 1973)

Type locality: São Paulo state .

Distribution: The original work of Hylton Scott (1973) did not provide precise locality data for the species and there was scarce additional information accompanying the type specimens (holotype and 2 paratypes MCN 1054; and paratype MACN 27622). Further literature, however, indicates that the species is found in caverns (e.g., Gnaspini and Trajano 1994) in São Paulo state, more specifically in Iporanga municipality, which is part of the Upper Ribeira Valley, famous for its multiple caves (e.g., Salvador et al. 2016). Nevertheless, further specimens have imprecise locality data: Fonseca and Thomé (1993) referred to shells from Cerro Azul municipality in Paraná state (erroneously listed as paratypes by those authors), but no additional information was given. Considering that Cerro Azul is also part of the Upper Ribeira Valley (and just 70 km SW of Iporanga), it is impossible to exclude the possibility that the specimens were collected in one of the many caves in the region. As such, the status of this species as a troglobitic remains uncertain.

Remarks: The placement of this species in Cystopeltidae follows the molecular phylogeny of Salvador et al. (2020), which removed the members of genera Zilchogyra and Lilloiconcha Weyrauch, 1965 from Charopidae and included them in Cystopeltidae .Those authors raised the possibility that a smooth protoconch could be a diagnostic character for South American cystopeltids.