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Marine Shells of the Western Coast of Flordia wm :iii! mm ilili ! Sfixing cHdL J^oad .Sandivicl'i, j\{ai.i.ach.u±£.tti. icuxucm \^*^£ FRONTISPIECE Photo by Ruth Bernhard Spondylus americanus Hermann MARINE SHELLS f>4 OF THE WESTERN COAST OF FLORIDA By LOUISE M. PERRY AND JEANNE S. SCHWENGEL With Revisions and Additions to Louise M. Perry's Marine Shells of the Southwest Coast of Florida Illustrations by W. Hammersley Southwick, Axel A. Olsson, and Frank White March, 1955 PALEONTOLOGICAL RESEARCH INSTITUTION ITHACA, NEW YORK U. S. A. MARINE SHELLS OF THE SOUTHWEST COAST OF FLORIDA printed as Bulletins of American Paleontology, vol. 26, No. 95 First printing, 1940 Second printing, 1942 Copyright, 1955, by Paleontological Research Institution Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 5-^-12005 Printed in the United States of America // is perhaps a more fortunate destiny to have a taste for collecting shells than to be born a millionaire. Robert Louis Stevenson imeters 50 lllllllllllllllllllllllllllll II II III nil 2 Inches CONTENTS Page Preface by reviser 7 Foreword by Wm. J. Clench 9 Introduction 11 Generalia 13 Collection and preparation of specimens 17 Systematic descriptions 24 Class Amphineura :. 24 Class Pelecypoda 27 Class Scaphopoda 97 Class Gasteropoda 101 Plates 199 Index 311 PREFACE BY THE REVISER It has been a privilege to revise Louise M. Perry's fine book on "Marine Shells of Southwest Florida", to include her studies on eggs and larvae of mollusks; and to add descriptions and illustra- tions of several newly discovered shells thus making it a more com- prehensive study of the molluscan life of western Florida. The work that I have done is only a small return to Dr. Perry for the many hours of instruction that she has given to me for so fascinating an avocation. Part of the material, other than that of Dr. Perry's, upon which the descriptions in this book are based, is in my collection. Sincere thanks are given to Harald A. Rehder, Joseph P. E. Morrison, R. Tucker Abbott, and Ruth Turner for help and advice; and especially to Henry A. Pilsbry and William J. Clench, who so generously gave of their valuable time to read the manuscript, which therefore, has been so materially improved by their suggestions and corrections. Acknowledgment is made of the valuable information gleaned from the pages of the "Manual of Conchology," "The Nautilus," "Johnsonia," and "American Sea Shells". Venia T. Phillips and Maurice E. Phillips of the Academy of Natural Sciences kindly veri- fied obscure references. My thanks are extended to Margaret Storey for permission to photograph her beautiful drawings of the eggs, egg capsules, and larvae; to Katherine V. W. Palmer for the use of photographs of egg capsules and for her help and advice in this revision; also to Marie Lebour, for the descriptions of eggs and larvae, which I have quoted. I am grateful to Axel Olsson and Frank White, who photo- graphed the shells and made the illustrations which have been added to this study, and to my husband, Frank R, Schwengel, for his help- fulness and encouragement. Scarsdale, New York March 5, 1954 Jeanne S. Schwengel FOREWORD This new and revised edition of Dr. Louise M. Perry's "Marine Shells of the Southwest Coast of Florida" will mark another mile- stone in our knowledge of Western Atlantic mollusks. The edition in 1940 was the first serious attempt to monograph a small regional area south of the State of New York. This newly revised edition by Dr. Perry and Dr. Jeanne S. Schwengel, not only adds several more species to this record, but in addition, much detail on the early life histories of many species. This is exceedingly important. We still know little regarding our mollusks other than that they exist. The task of finding life history data is not easy, and it calls for pro- longed study in the field. Casual collecting can add a few details, but only continuity of observation can chain the facts together. I can recall vividly the day I spent with Dr. Perry in her little laboratory on Sanibel Island. This was many years ago. As fast as she could locate "live egg cases", they were added to her aquaria, and when the young hatched they were drawn and notes made on their development until they were large enough to be identified with a known species. Dr. Schwengel has screened this large mass of data and added all that were conclusive to the species in this area. Cambridge, Mass. William J. Clench, March, 1954 Curator of Mollusks, Museum of Comparative Zoology, Harvard University 11 INTRODUCTION Some fifth of a century ago when I first saw a Florida beach, with its multitudes of shells they seemed worthy of attention only as adding variety to the general attraction of the seashore; but within a few tides times the lion's paw, the angel's wing, the fight- ing conch and the calico shell had acquired individuality and stimu- lated an interest that must enrich any experience which includes them. The abundance and variety of southern Florida's molluscan fauna is unexcelled by any other in America, and by but few areas of like extent anywhere. This circumstance is due to a combination of ecological factors related to latitude, sufficient bathymetric range for slight differences of water temperature, characters of sea bottom, and some local modifications of salinity due to drainage of fresh water from the Okeechobee basin and other areas. The littoral region has many general characteristics of sand, mud and weedy bottom. Oyster- bars, sandbars and mangrove flats, and in deeper water, rock and coral reefs and outcroppings of hardpan have their peculiar associa- tions of mollusks and other marine animals. Species native to a more southerly province overlap some which have a more northerlj^ range, and some genera common on the southern Atlantic Coast are es- tablished along the Gulf Coast without continuity of any of their species around the southern tip of the Florida Peninsula. All descriptions apply to specimens which were taken alive or in such fresh and perfect conditions that a local station may rea- sonably be assumed. All measurements refer to average sizes, adult shells, and all illustrations are of recently collected specimens. The study collection upon which the descriptions are based has been placed in the Thomas R. Baker Museum at Winter Park, Florida. 12 Marine Shells of the Western Coast of Floruja The 'List of Marine Mollusca from Labrador to Texas', by Charles W. Johnson (Boston, 1934) is used as the basis of classi- fication and nomenclature. Free use has been made of available conchological literature. Acknowledgment of valuable assistance is made with pleasure to Dr. Henry A. Pilsbry, to Dr. Paul Bartsch, to Dr. Harald A. Rehder, to Richard F. McLean and Jeanne S. Schwengel. Thanks are due to George W. Underbill and George W. Underbill, Jr. for skillful use of boats and dredges. Dr. Eugene W. Gudger has been kind enough to read the manuscript and offer many helpful suggestions. L. M. P. Sanibel Island, Florida. [ 1940] 13 GENERALIA Shelled mollusks belong to one of the most ancient groups of animal life. Five hundred million years ago there lived in the Cam- brian period of the earth's geologic history snails with shells so complex and perfect that their presence can be explained only by the existence of ancestral forms in a period far more distant. These fossil remains are of great importance in the study and chronological interpretation of the earth's geologic past. Their presence in strati- fied rocks determines the periods in which successive layers of sedi- ment were deposited in ancient seas, and the evolution of primitive molluscan shells may be traced through these sedimentary deposits to the shells of Recent families and genera. Certain shells from Ter- tiary deposits in the Okeechobee and Caloosahatchee basins are of types which persist in the living molluscan fauna of Florida waters. Emanuel Mendes da Costa/ 178 years ago wrote: — The study of Shells, or testaceous animals, is a branch of Natural History, though not greatly useful in human oeconomy, yet perhaps, by the infinite beauties of the subjects it treats of, is adapted to recreate the senses, and insensibly to lead the amazed admirer into the contem- plation of the glory of the Divinity, in their creation. The British conchologist George Perry, expressed a like feel- ing in the introduction of his "Conchology, or the Natural History of Shells", pubHshed at London in 1811. The sentiment was not unique, for the symmetry and beauty of shells have suggested many forms in art and architecture, and in some parts of the world their use as objects of utility, ornament and symbolism is presently con- tinuous with the practice of early man. North American Indian tribes which practiced totemism used shells {Cypraea moneta) in their ritual of death and resurrection, and so recently as eighteen forty- eight to the eighties, Maplewood Institute for Young Ladies, at Pittsfield, Massachusetts, listed Conchology in its regular curricu- lum as a subject of cultural value to its students. Certain elementary principles must be understood before an intelligent approach can be made to the study of shells. It is a matter of common knowledge that animals differ widely in appear- 1 Elements of Conchology, 1776 — 14 Marine Shells of the Western Coast of Florida ance and anatomical structure. These differences form the basis of classification of all animal forms— first into two principal groups mvertebrates and vertebrates, or those forms without a backbone and those possessing one. These groups are divided into phyla (Gr., phylon, meaning race or tribe). Each phylum is subdivided on the basis of anatomical structure into groups which show the increas- ingly closer relationships which establish class, order, family, genus, and species.
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