Lanistes nyassanus

Lanistes nyassanus is a species of large freshwater snail, an aquatic gastropod mollusk with a gill and an operculum in the family Ampullariidae, the apple snails. The shell of this species is unusual in that it has left-handed shell-coiling.

Lanistes nyassanus
Scientific classification
Kingdom:
Animalia
Phylum:
Mollusca
Class:
Gastropoda
(unranked):
clade Caenogastropoda
informal group Architaenioglossa
Superfamily:
Ampullarioidea
Family:
Ampullariidae
Subfamily:
Ampullariinae
Tribe:
Ampullariini
Genus:
Lanistes
Species:
L. nyassanus
Binomial name
Lanistes nyassanus
Dohrn, 1865[2]

The specific name nyassanus is derived from the type locality of the species, Lake Nyassa.

Distribution

Lanistes nyassanus is found in Malawi and Mozambique.[1] Found in sand and weeds, it is common at 1.5 meters depth, but some have been found as deep as 35 meters.[1]

The type locality is the southern end of Lake Nyassa.[2]

Description

The width of the shell is 75 mm; the height of the shell is 68 mm.[3]

Behavior

These snails burrow into sand to hide from fish.[1]

References
  1. Albrecht, C. & Clewing, C. 2018. Lanistes nyassanus. The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species 2018: e.T184645A120111694. https://dx.doi.org/10.2305/IUCN.UK.2018-2.RLTS.T184645A120111694.en. Downloaded on 28 December 2018.
  2. Dohrn H. (1865). "List of the land and freshwater shells of the Zambezi and Lake Nyasa, eastern tropical Africa, collected by John Kirk". Proceedings of the Zoological Society of London 1865: 231-234. page 233.
  3. Brown D. S. (1994). Freshwater Snails of Africa and their Medical Importance. Taylor & Francis. ISBN 0-7484-0026-5.


This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.