Gastropods Morphometric Shell Landmarks variation in Diyala River Basin, Iraq

Abstract

The present study was conducted to detected the variation in the shells of the Freshwater Gastropods species of Diyala River Basin in Iraq. For this purpose the study area was divided to two sectors, Northern and Southern sectors. The morphological variation in the shells among common species to Northern and Southern sectors using a Geometric Morphometric technique were examined. The most abundant species Theodoxus jordani, Melanopsis praemorsa, Lymnaea natalensis, and Planorbis gibbonsi were collected and their shells variation in the size and shape were measured. The results showed significant difference in centroid size for M. praemorsa and L. natalensis while didn’t record in T. jordani and Poggibonsi. Also the study didn’t record significance variance of symmetrical for size and shape of the shell in all species.