Mitra snails
| Mitra snails | ||||||||||||
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Miter miter with extended proboscis . From: William Charles Linnaeus, Martin Pictorial Museum of Animated Nature (1848–1849). |
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| Scientific name | ||||||||||||
| Mitridae | ||||||||||||
| Swainson , 1829 |
The Mitra snails (Mitridae) are one of the larger families of snails with 375 species. The system of this family is very confusing. A total of over 2500 species have been described, but most of them are synonyms .
features
The housings vary from egg-shaped to highly conical . The siphon channel is always relatively short. The spindle has typical folds. The adult size is about 1 to 7 cm. There is no operculum . The head is relatively small and has no snout. The antennae are short, the eyes are at the base of the antennae. The rasp tongue (radula) is triserial, i. H. with three elements per transverse row or only with one element per transverse row. The egg capsules are attached to a hard substrate and contain about 100 to 1000 eggs. A total of up to 170 egg capsules are deposited. Veliger larvae hatch from this, i.e. H. the larvae are plankton-eating. Similar to the Muricidae , the hypobranchial glands are used to generate a colorless secretion that turns purple when exposed to light.
Way of life
Mitra snails live in tropical and subtropical seas up to about 40 degrees north and south. Most species can be found there in the coastal area or further coastal area in shallow water. Only a few species go into the deeper water (up to about 1600 m). Most species live on hard floors in or near coral reefs as well as on the sandy floors between the coral structures. Only a few species prefer soft soils. They feed predatory, mostly on injection worms (Sipuncula), but also on other molluscs and crustaceans . The prey is first paralyzed with the help of a secretion from the salivary glands. Carrion is also eaten. On the other hand, mitra snails are very often the victim of other boring snails, e.g. B. Muricidae and Naticidae .
Systematics
Bouchet & Rocroi (2005) divide the family into three subfamilies:
- Cylindromitrinae Cossmann, 1899
- Imbricarinae Troschel, 1867
- Mitrinae Swainson, 1829
literature
- Philippe Bouchet & Jean-Pierre Rocroi: Part 2. Working classification of the Gastropoda. In: Malacologia. 47, 2005, 239-283, ISSN 0076-2997 .
- Victor Millard: Classification of the Mollusca. A Classification of World Wide Mollusca. Rhine Road, South Africa 1997, ISBN 0-620-21261-6 .
- Winston Ponder & David Lindberg : Towards a phylogeny of gastropod molluscs; an analysis using morphological characters. In: Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society. 119, 1997, 83-265, ISSN 0024-4082 .
- Frank Riedel: Origin and evolution of the "higher" Caenogastropoda. Berliner Geoscientific Abhandlungen, Series E, Volume 32, Berlin 2000, 240 pages, ISBN 3-89582-077-6 .
- John D. Taylor (1989): The diet of coral-reef Mitridae (Gastropoda) from Guam; with a review of other species of the family. Journal of Natural History 23 (1), pp. 261-278, doi: 10.1080 / 00222938900770141 .
