Curator’s Corner

Museum, research, and collection updates from Dr. José H. Leal, plus Shell of the Week, which highlights a different species every other Friday. Most Shells of the Week are found in Southwest Florida.

Dr. José H. Leal serves as the Bailey-Matthews National Shell Museum & Aquarium’s Science Director and Curator. He received his Ph.D. in Marine Biology and Fisheries from the University of Miami and has served at the Museum since 1996.

Shell of the Week: The Little Speckled Slipper Snail

Crepidula ustulatulina Collin, 2000, is a local gastropod that reaches only about 13 mm (about 0.5 inch). Its shell is oval, thin, and convex. Slipper snails have an unusual shelf that serves as protection to the animal’s most delicate organs. The shelf margin in this species is arched and extends further forward (downward in the photos) on its left side. As the common name of the species indicates, the shell usually displays a speckled color pattern, with distinct chestnut-brown spots or streak

Shell of the Week: The Scotch Bonnet

What can I say about Semicassis granulata (Born, 1778) that hasn’t already been said? One of the prized local finds on the barrier islands of Southwest Florida, the Scotch Bonnet is rarely found locally, being apparently more common on the open beaches of the mid-Atlantic states, from Florida up to North Carolina (the species is the State Shell of the latter state.) Its attractive shell may reach up to 10 cm (about 4 inches) and is egg-shaped, with a delicate grid-like (cancellate) sculpture, an

Giant Squid Genome Unveiled!

The Giant Squid, Architeuthis dux Steenstrup, 1857, is the largest living invertebrate, with females attaining about 13 m (43 ft) in length. The species genome was recently unraveled by a team of scientists led by Rute da Fonseca of the University of Copenhagen, Denmark. The genome is the total DNA set of an organism, a system that contains all the hereditary information for a given species. Complete sets of the genome of an organism are included in all cells that have a nucleus.The results of t

Striate Piddocks: Stowaways for Life

The Striate Piddock, Martesia striata (Linnaeus, 1758) is one of the species of wood-boring bivalves found along the coast of SW Florida. Its shells may be found on local beaches, always confined to pieces of driftwood, such as the little (11 cm, or about 4.5-inch) log in the top part of the picture. The log is riddled with the remnants of a few hundred Striate Piddocks. They may grow to be more than an inch long, and have free-living larvae that live in excess of a month drifting in the ocean.

Shell of the Week: The Dark Cerith

Cerithium atratum (Born, 1778) is the most common among the six species of the family Cerithiidae present on the barrier islands of Southwest Florida. Its shell grows to about 40 mm (about 1.5 inches) and bears a sculpture of spiral (revolving) cords crossed by axial ("vertical") ribs. Beads form at the intersection of those cords and ribs. Those spiral cords are separated by smaller spiral lines. The shell color is dirt-white to gray covered with irregular brown spots or flecks. This detritus-f

Fabio Moretzsohn: 1964-2020

As some of you may already know, this week we lost a friend and well-known malacologist at the peak of his productive scientific and educational career. On Monday, January 6, 2020, Dr. Fabio Moretzsohn passed away, of complications from lung cancer. Fabio received his B.S. in Biology in 1987 from the University of São Paulo, in Brazil. In 1993, he received his M.S. in Biology from the University of the Ryukyus in Okinawa, Japan, and in 2003 was awarded his Ph.D. in Zoology from the University of

A Tumbling Snail

Most mollusk species are known only from their shell. But a peek at a beautiful shell can hardly reveal the life habits of the mollusk that made it. Take, for instance, the snail known as Gaza daedala Watson, 1879, a deep-sea species of gastropod from the South and Central Pacific. Reaching about 40 mm (about 1.5 inch), its attractive shell is smooth, iridescent, with delicate pearly hues, resembling the internal layers of abalones, pen shells, and some mussels. The species was named in 1879 by

The Photogenic Wonderpus

Despite its striking (and very unusual) appearance, the Wunderpus Octopus was only described as a species new to science in 2006. Wunderpus photogenicus Hochberg, Norman, & Finn, 2006 have a typical coloration of white band-like markings over a reddish-brown background, but no two individuals show exactly the same pattern. In addition to the distinctive coloration, Wonderpus Octopuses have very long, slender arms and eyes at the end of elongated stalks that protrude from the mantle. They are mas

Shell of the Week: The Tampa Drill

Eupleura tampaensis (Conrad, 1846), reaches about 25 mm (an inch) and has a markedly angled shell outline, with a sculpture of about 12 strong axial (“vertical”) ribs crossed by equally strong spiral cords. Could be confused with two species of similar size and proportions: the Mauve-mouth Drill, Calotrophon ostrearum, which has a more rounded, “gentler,” not-angled outline and sculpture of axial ribs that are larger than the spiral cords, or the Gulf Oyster Drill, Vokesinotus perrugatus, which

Telltale Shell Parts: The Pallial Sinus

The pallial sinus is an etched “bent line” present on the inside of some bivalve shells, at their posterior end. The sinus is a continuation of the pallial line, a scar that indicates the limit of the bivalve body that is attached internally to its shell. The pallial sinus corresponds to a "pouch" in the animal body that houses the siphons when they are retracted. The siphons are fleshy tubes that can be expanded for the intake and outtake of water for respiration and feeding. Usually, bivalves