Guido Poppe


Guido T. Poppe is a Belgian malacologist, shell dealer and author of more than 20 books and publications about shells, mainly about the families Volutidae and Trochidae.

Biography

The son of an enthusiastic sports fisherman, Guido became fascinated at a young age by marine life during yearly holidays in Brittany, France. His first diving experiences were in these cold waters in 1968.
He developed a career as a professional freelance conchologist. This allowed him to dive in many parts of the world, in European waters and in many tropical seas from Baja California to Queensland, Australia. In 2003 he moved from Belgium to the Philippines. Most of his dives are now concentrated in the Philippines. After more than 6,000 dives, he has compiled an extensive collection of photographs of seashells and marine life.
His interest in conchology gradually brought him fame in this field, mainly through publishing books on the subject.
He was the vice-president of the Société Belge de Malacologie for eight years.

Scientific work

He discovered more than 1000 new species of Mollusca and described more than 230 of these, mainly in the families Volutidae and Trochidae and on the Philippine malacofauna. The World Register of Marine Species has already listed 311 marine species named by Poppe in its database. More than 40 species have been named after him by scientists from all over the world either with the epithet poppei, guidopoppei or guidoi.
In July 2004 Guido Poppe created together with his son Philippe Poppe the journal, Visaya, specialising in the taxonomy of Mollusca. He named the calliostoma topsnail Calliostoma philippeiPoppe, 2004, another sea snail Calliotropis philippei Poppe, Tagaro & Dekker, 2006 and Bayerotrochus philpoppei Anseeuw, Poppe & Goto, 2006 after his son. Guido Poppe named the topsnail Calliostoma mariae after his mother Maria Peyskens.

Scientific collections

As a collector he built major conchological collections, which are now housed in prestigious museums all over the world: