''Chicoreus palmarosae'' (rose-branch murex) is a

species A species () is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriate sexes or mating types can produce fertile offspring, typically by sexual reproduction. It is the basic unit of Taxonomy (biology), ...

of predatory

sea snail Sea snails are slow-moving marine (ocean), marine gastropod Mollusca, molluscs, usually with visible external shells, such as whelk or abalone. They share the Taxonomic classification, taxonomic class Gastropoda with slugs, which are distinguishe ...

, a marine

gastropod Gastropods (), commonly known as slugs and snails, belong to a large Taxonomy (biology), taxonomic class of invertebrates within the phylum Mollusca called Gastropoda (). This class comprises snails and slugs from saltwater, freshwater, and fro ...

mollusk Mollusca is a phylum of protostomic invertebrate animals, whose members are known as molluscs or mollusks (). Around 76,000 extant species of molluscs are recognized, making it the second-largest animal phylum after Arthropoda. The ...

in the family

Muricidae Muricidae is a large and varied taxonomic family of small to large predatory sea snails, marine gastropod mollusks, commonly known as murex snails or rock snails. With over 1,700 living species, the Muricidae represent almost 10% of the Neog ...

, the murex snails.

Description

The size of an adult shell varies between 65 mm and 130 mm. It is mostly dark red with branch like structures all over the conch.

Distribution

This species occurs in the Indian Ocean along the Chagos Atoll and the

Mascarene The Mascarene Islands (, ) or Mascarenes or Mascarenhas Archipelago is a group of islands in the Indian Ocean east of Madagascar consisting of islands belonging to the Republic of Mauritius as well as the French department of Réunion. Their na ...

Basin; in the Pacific Ocean along

Sri Lanka Sri Lanka, officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka, also known historically as Ceylon, is an island country in South Asia. It lies in the Indian Ocean, southwest of the Bay of Bengal, separated from the Indian subcontinent, ...

and Southwest

Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...

References

* Drivas, J. & M. Jay (1988). ''Coquillages de La Réunion et de l'île Maurice'' * Schmidt, W. & O. Bellec (1994). Findings of some uncommon sea-shells off Madagascar. ''African Journal of Tropical Hydrobiology and Fisheries'' 5(1): 63 - 66.

External links

* Gastropods described in 1822 Taxa named by Jean-Baptiste Lamarck Chicoreus {{Muricinae-stub