''Lunella coronata'', common name the crowned turban shell or the coronate moon turban, 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), ...

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 Family (from ) is a Social group, group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or Affinity (law), affinity (by marriage or other relationship). It forms the basis for social order. Ideally, families offer predictabili ...

Turbinidae Turbinidae, the turban snails, are a family of small to large marine gastropod molluscs in the superfamily Trochoidea.Bouchet, P. (2014). Turbinidae Rafinesque, 1815. Accessed through: World Register of Marine Species at http://www.marinespecie ...

, the turban snails.

Description

The shell grows to a length of 4 cm, with conspicuous flattened, cup-like scales interspersed by small, regular rows of nodules. The colour of the shell is pale to greenish, flecked with purplish-brown markings (often encrusted with light pink coralline algae). The operculum is smooth to faintly granular with pale green centre. (Richmond, 1997). The solid, imperforate shell has a depressed-turbinate shape with a diameter greater than the altitude. It is covered with an irregular spiral series of nodules and granules, of which the subsutural series and two on the median portion of the

body whorl The body whorl is part of the morphology (biology), morphology of the gastropod shell, shell in those gastropod mollusks that possess a coiled shell. The term is also sometimes used in a similar way to describe the shell of a cephalopod mollusk ...

are more prominent. The

spire A spire is a tall, slender, pointed structure on top of a roof of a building or tower, especially at the summit of church steeples. A spire may have a square, circular, or polygonal plan, with a roughly conical or pyramidal shape. Spire ...

is depressed, dome-shaped with an apex that is frequently eroded and red. The shell contains 4 to 5

whorl A whorl ( or ) is an individual circle, oval, volution or equivalent in a whorled pattern, which consists of a spiral or multiple concentric objects (including circles, ovals and arcs). In nature File:Photograph and axial plane floral diagra ...

s, the last very large. The large

aperture In optics, the aperture of an optical system (including a system consisting of a single lens) is the hole or opening that primarily limits light propagated through the system. More specifically, the entrance pupil as the front side image o ...

is round and iridescent within. The wide

columella Lucius Junius Moderatus Columella (, Arabic: ) was a prominent Roman writer on agriculture in the Roman Empire. His in twelve volumes has been completely preserved and forms an important source on Roman agriculture and ancient Roman cuisin ...

is flattened and excavated, deflexed recurved and somewhat channelled at its base, The inside of the operculum is flat, greenish and golden, iridescent, with about 5–6 whorls and a subcentral nucleus. Its outside is convex, greenish, sparsely granulate all over. The species is subject to a wide variation. The passage from the strongly tuberculate forms into those in which the transverse striae simply cut the lirae into diamonds or granules is made by imperceptible degrees.G.W. Tryon (1888), Manual of Conchology X; Academy of Natural Sciences, Philadelphia
(described as ''Turbo coronatus'')

Habitat

This species can be found in the upper eulittoral zone, in pools or under stones. Turbo creniferus eye

Distribution

This marine species occurs in the

Red Sea The Red Sea is a sea inlet of the Indian Ocean, lying between Africa and Asia. Its connection to the ocean is in the south, through the Bab-el-Mandeb Strait and the Gulf of Aden. To its north lie the Sinai Peninsula, the Gulf of Aqaba, and th ...

, off Southeast Africa, 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 and in the Indo-Pacific.

References

* Dautzenberg, Ph. (1929). ''Contribution à l'étude de la faune de Madagascar: Mollusca marina testacea. Faune des colonies françaises, III(fasc. 4).'' Société d'Editions géographiques, maritimes et coloniales: Paris. 321–636, plates IV-VII pp. * Herbert D.G. (1988). ''Studies on Priotrochus obscurus and the systematics position of Priotrochus (Mollusca: Gastropoda: Trochidae).'' Journal of zoology 214: 561–268. * * Alf A. & Kreipl K. (2003). A Conchological Iconography: The Family Turbinidae, Subfamily Turbininae, Genus Turbo. Conchbooks, Hackenheim Germany. * Nakano T., Takashashi K. & Ozawa T. (2007) ''Description of an endangered new species of Lunella (Gastropoda: Turbinidae) from the Ogasawara Islands'', Japan. Venus 66(1–2): 1–10.

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Lunella coronata coronata Gastropods described in 1791 Taxa named by Johann Friedrich Gmelin