''Scutellastra aphanes'' 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

true limpet The Patellogastropoda, common name true limpets and historically called the Docoglossa, are members of a major phylogenetic group of marine gastropods, treated by experts either as a clade or as a taxonomic order. The clade Patellogastropoda is ...

, 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 ...

Patellidae Patellidae is a taxonomic family of true limpets, marine gastropod molluscs in the superfamily Patelloidea. (The superfamily Patelloidea should not be confused with the similar-sounding genus of true limpets '' Patelloida'' which is in the ...

, one of the families of true limpets. It is endemic to

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. Its Provinces of South Africa, nine provinces are bounded to the south by of coastline that stretches along the Atlantic O ...

Taxonomy

''Scutellastra aphanes'' was originally described by Gary Robson in 1986, as ''Patella aphanes''. The specific name "aphanes" means "unseen" or "unnoticed" in Greek. The species and other Southern African ''Patella'' were later moved to ''Scutellastra'' in 1998 based on morphological analysis.

Description

''Scutellastra aphanes'' consists of two distinct ecomorphs, one associated with beds of the mussel Perna perna and the other on nearby rocks. The most striking difference between the two is that the rock-dwelling form possesses more prominent shell ribs and the ventral margin is not concave in profile, unlike the mussel-dwelling form.

Distribution

References

Patellidae Gastropods described in 1986 {{Patellidae-stub