''Scaphella junonia'',

common name In biology, a common name of a taxon or organism (also known as a vernacular name, English name, colloquial name, country name, popular name, or farmer's name) is a name that is based on the normal language of everyday life; and is often con ...

s the junonia, or Juno's volute, 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 large

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

Volutidae Volutidae, common name volutes, are a taxonomic family of predatory sea snails that range in size from 9 mm to over 500 mm. They are marine gastropod mollusks. Most of the species have no operculum. Distribution This family of sea s ...

, the volutes. This species lives in water from 29 m to 126 m depth in the tropical Western Atlantic. Because of its deepwater habitat, the

shell Shell may refer to: Architecture and design * Shell (structure), a thin structure ** Concrete shell, a thin shell of concrete, usually with no interior columns or exterior buttresses Science Biology * Seashell, a hard outer layer of a marine ani ...

usually only washes up onto beaches after strong storms, or

hurricane A tropical cyclone is a rapidly rotating storm system with a low-pressure area, a closed low-level atmospheric circulation, strong winds, and a spiral arrangement of thunderstorms that produce heavy rain and squalls. Depending on its ...

s. The species is named after the ancient Roman goddess Juno.

Distribution

''Scaphella junonia'' is found throughout

Florida Florida ( ; ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It borders the Gulf of Mexico to the west, Alabama to the northwest, Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia to the north, the Atlantic ...

Texas Texas ( , ; or ) is the most populous U.S. state, state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. It borders Louisiana to the east, Arkansas to the northeast, Oklahoma to the north, New Mexico to the we ...

and the

Gulf of Mexico The Gulf of Mexico () is an oceanic basin and a marginal sea of the Atlantic Ocean, mostly surrounded by the North American continent. It is bounded on the northeast, north, and northwest by the Gulf Coast of the United States; on the southw ...

. * A subspecies, ''Scaphella junonia johnstoneae'', is found off of

Alabama Alabama ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern and Deep South, Deep Southern regions of the United States. It borders Tennessee to the north, Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia to the east, Florida and the Gu ...

and is the state shell of that state. It is named for Kathleen Yerger Johnstone, an amateur conchologist from Alabama who published two books on seashell collecting. * Another subspecies, ''Scaphella junonia butleri'', is found off of the Yucatan.

Shell description

The largest recorded

of ''Scaphella junonia'' is 154 mm in length. The shell is cream in color with about 12 spiral rows of somewhat squarish brown dots. The large

protoconch A protoconch (meaning first or earliest or original shell) is an embryonic or larval shell which occurs in some classes of molluscs, e.g., the initial chamber of an ammonite or the larval shell of a gastropod. In older texts it is also called " ...

is tan. The

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 ...

of the shell is almost 3/4 of the length of the shell.

Human relevance

The shell was historically greatly prized for its beauty and apparent rarity. It is however commonly taken (accidentally as

bycatch Bycatch (or by-catch), in the fishing industry, is a fish or other marine species that is caught unintentionally while fishing for specific species or sizes of wildlife. Bycatch is either the wrong species, the wrong sex, or is undersized or juve ...

) from deeper water during commercial

trawling Trawling is an industrial method of fishing that involves pulling a fishing net through the water behind one or more boats. The net used for trawling is called a trawl. This principle requires netting bags which are towed through water to catch di ...

by shrimp fishermen in the Gulf of Mexico. This source provides plenty of specimens for the shell trade, and so the price of a specimen shell is relatively low. However, the shell is still very hard to find naturally cast up on beaches, so people who find a junonia while shelling on Sanibel Island, Florida, often get their picture in the local newspapers.

References

;Citations ;Bibliography
Conchologists of America, Peter Dance article on this species
* Rosenberg, G. 1992. ''Encyclopedia of Seashells''. Dorset: New York. 224 pp. page(s): 99 * Bail, P & Poppe, G. T. 2001. ''A conchological iconography: a taxonomic introduction of the recent Volutidae''. Hackenheim-Conchbook, 30 pp, 5 pl. * Rosenberg, G., F. Moretzsohn, and E. F. García. 2009. ''Gastropoda (Mollusca) of the Gulf of Mexico'', Pp. 579–699 in Felder, D.L. and D.K. Camp (eds.), Gulf of Mexico–Origins, Waters, and Biota. Biodiversity. Texas A&M Press, College Station, Texas.

Distribution

Shell description

Human relevance

References

Further reading