Sunday Oct 19, 2025
Sunday Oct 19, 2025
Friday, 10 October 2025 04:57 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}
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Dr. Dinarzarde Raheem |
The Nations Trust WNPS Monthly Lecture will be held on Thursday, 16 October at 6 p.m., at Jasmine Hall, Bandaranaike Memorial International Conference Hall (BMICH).
Sri Lanka’s incredibly diverse land-snail fauna is dominated by endemic species. Most of these endemic species are wholly or nearly dependent on natural forest, and most are restricted to small ranges in the wetter parts of the island. The question that underpins her study of this fauna is, “What historical and contemporary forces have shaped what species are found at a particular place?” In this lecture, she will discuss her efforts to investigate this question, explore the approaches used for studying species-rich yet poorly known taxa such as land snails, and highlight the crucial importance of this kind of research for conserving Sri Lanka’s endemic biota.
The public’s attention often gravitates toward charismatic, large animals such as the elephant, leopard, and whale — species that dominate research and conservation efforts globally. In contrast, invertebrates like land snails, which make up more than 80% of all living species, are comparatively neglected. Her research on the composition of Sri Lankan land-snail assemblages at geographical scales ranging from local (e.g., a single site) to regional (e.g., across multiple climatic zones) offers intriguing and crucial insights into the diversity, distribution, and evolution of an invertebrate group dominated by species found only on the island (more than 80% of recognised Sri Lankan land-snail species are endemic). This work also has important implications for conserving forest-living species. Her research, for example, has shown that while certain types of non-forest habitats can support rainforest species, they are not a substitute for conserving species in their natural habitat.
Dinarzarde Raheem is a Senior Lecturer at the Rajarata University of Sri Lanka, where she is based at the Department of Biological Sciences, Faculty of Applied Sciences. Her research is broad-based, cutting across systematics, taxonomy, community ecology, and palaeoecology, with the land-snail fauna of South Asia—particularly that of Sri Lanka and India’s Western Ghats—being a specific focus. She has a wide-ranging interest in natural history collections, encompassing collections-based research, capacity building, collections development, and curation.
Presented by the Wildlife and Nature Protection Society (WNPS) as part of its monthly lecture series, with the support of Nations Trust Bank, the lecture is free and open to both members and non-members, offering expert conservation insights in just 60 minutes.
