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.

The Lunar Dove Snail

The Lunar Dove Snail, Astyris lunata (Say, 1826), is one of the local shallow-water microgastropods associated with seaweed. Living dove snails can be found crawling on clumps of brown algae stranded on Southwest Florida beaches after storms. Its shell rarely surpasses 5 mm (about 0.2 inch), and show a pattern of alternating, sinuous brown and white markings. They are essentially devoid of any sculpture. The live animal (photo on right) was collected by Rebecca Mensch on stranded seaweed, on San

The Pear Whelk

For the last two weeks this column covered the renowned Lightning Whelk, Sinistrofulgur sinistrum. Today I want to introduce its smaller, right-handed cousin, the Pear Whelk, Fulguropsis spirata (Lamarck, 1816). Pear Whelks can reach 15 cm (about 6 inches). The shell is thin, with a long anterior canal and short, flattened spire. The color shows variations around the theme of a cream background with axial (“longitudinal”) brown streaks. The egg cases in this species resemble those of the Lightni

The Lightning Whelk, Part 2

Last week I discussed some of the distinguishing features of and cool facts about the Lightning Whelk, Sinistrofulgur sinistrum (Hollister, 1958). Today I want to explore certain aspects of the reproduction in this celebrated species. As with most of the large, predatory marine snails, Lightning Whelks have separate sexes, and females lay eggs inside protective egg capsules. Each egg capsule may contain a few dozen eggs, and capsules are attached to each other through a string—one string may con

The Lightning Whelk, Part 1

The Lightning Whelk, Sinistrofulgur sinistrum (Hollister, 1958), is one of the local molluscan celebrities, not only because of its large size, but also thanks to very special features that make this species truly remarkable. For instance, unlike most gastropods, which are right-handed, the Lightning Whelk has a left-handed shell (shell opening to the left with shell spire pointing “up”). Abnormally right-handed Lightning Whelks are very uncommon, but may be found on rare occasions. Male individ

The Orange Hoof Snail

The Orange Hoof Snail, Hipponix subrufus (Lamarck, 1822), has a cap-shaped shell that grows up to 12 mm (about 0.5 inch). It has a reticulated sculpture of concentric ridges crossed by radial cords of about same size. The shell inside has a horseshoe-shaped muscle attachment scar. The shell color is usually light orange-brown, and fresh specimens have a thick, light-brown periostracum. Hoof snails live attached to hard surfaces, and are frequently found on the shells of other mollusks. The shell

The Sunrise Tellin

The Sunrise Tellin, Tellina radiata Linnaeus, 1758, is likely the most attractive of all tellins (family Tellinidae) found in the western Atlantic Ocean. Its shell is large (up to 65 mm, or about 2.5 inches), glossy, and delicately colored with yellow hues and reddish radial stripes that resemble rays of the rising sun. Its presence on Sanibel and Captiva, however, is questionable—only four entries of the species from the islands exist in the National Shell Museum collection, all collected prior

The One-banded Wentletrap

The One-banded Wentletrap, Epitonium unifasciatum (G.B. Sowerby II, 1844), is one of the less common among the 9 species of wentletraps (family Epitoniidae) found on Sanibel-Captiva. Its shell rarely surpasses 13 mm (about 0.5 inch), and is festooned with 7–10 costae (“ribs”) that are joined from one whorl to the next. The species name alludes to the narrow, light-brown band present below the suture. The shell in the photos is a juvenile, lacking a well-defined brown band. It measures 8 mm, and

The Comb Bittersweet

The Comb Bittersweet, Tucetona pectinata (Gmelin, 1791) is the most common out of three locally found species of the bittersweet family, the Glycymerididae. Its shell may reach 30 mm (about 1.2 inches), and is circular, with a sculpture of 20–35 relatively wide ribs that are flat in cross-section. The shell hinge has about 20–24 small “teeth”. The color is variable, usually white to grayish-white with irregular brown streaks of variable hues. Bittersweet clams have numerous, simple eyes that res

The Gray Pigmy Venus

With 20 species and counting, the Venus clams family (Veneridae) is the most diverse (most species) of all the local, shallow-water bivalve families. There are species of many different sizes, ranging from the Brown Gem Clam (Parastarte triquetra) at 3 mm (about 0.12 inch) to the large Southern Quahog (Mercenaria campechiensis), which can exceed 150 mm (about 6 inches). Our featured species, the Gray Pigmy Venus, Chioneryx grus (Holmes, 1858), is one of the smallest (as its vernacular name impli

The Northern Quahog

The Northern Quahog, Mercenaria mercenaria (Linnaeus, 1758), measures up to 120 mm (about five inches). Its shell is trigonal to rounded, with commarginal ("concentric") ridges on the outer surface. It differs from its closest relative (and local native species), the Southern Quahog, Mercenaria campechiensis, by smaller maximum size, lack of commarginal ridges on central part of the external shell surface, and, most of all, by the violet-color tinges on the internal surface of its valves (absent