At the Central European – Balkan transition: forest land snail faunas of the Banat contrasted with those of the Carpathian chain

Twenty-nine forest sites in six sampling areas in the Banat region of Romania, adjacent to Serbia, were sampled to obtain inventories of their snail faunas and to make comparisons between these and previously studied faunas in the mountains from the Sudetes in the north-west to the Southern Transylvanian Carpathians in the south. 65 species were recorded overall, with between 13 and 33 at individual sites. Among the six sampling areas that on Schist rock at high altitude differed markedly from the others, and contained mainly species also found in Carpathian forests further north. The remainder, mainly on limestone, also differed among themselves, but contained more species endemic to the region or regions to the south, together with those found mainly in open rocky habitats further north. Some species and subspecies were restricted to particular areas within the region, and although ecological factors accounted for some of these differences, they did not explain all of them. The faunas...