Atactodea striata | |
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Scientific classification ![]() | |
Domain: | Eukaryota |
Kingdom: | Animalia |
Phylum: | Mollusca |
Class: | Bivalvia |
Order: | Venerida |
Family: | Mesodesmatidae |
Genus: | Atactodea |
Species: | A. striata |
Binomial name | |
Atactodea striata Gmelin, 1791 | |
Atactodea striata, common name striated beach clam or striated little trough shell, is a species of surf clam, a marine bivalve mollusk in the family Mesodesmatidae.
Atactodea is the abundant, small, relatively strongly concentrically ribbed mesodesmatid. [1]
Found in atoll lagoons throughout the Indo-Pacific including Madagascar, India, Viet Nam, China, Philippines, Tarawa, Malaysia, Australia, Papua New Guinea, New Caledonia, Tuvalu, Fiji, Japan (up to Kii Peninsula, Honshu), and Vanuatu. [2] It has been introduced in the Mediterranean Sea in the areas of Israel and Malta. [3] [4]
Found in sandy substrates in the intertidal zone. [5] [6] This small surf clam may occur in abundance on high intertidal lagoon beaches. [7]
These clams are readily available by foraging the inshore tidal flats, mangroves and rocks. Archeological evidence indicates that Atactodea striata were used as a subsistence food by the Lapita, a Neolithic people of the South Pacific, at least as early as 4,700 years ago. [5] They are among the most common bivalves found in 2000 year-old shell middens in Papua New Guinea [8] and in more recent shell middens in Australia. [9] Called "Alure" in South Vanuatu Languages, Atactodea striata is harvested by the indigenous people of Vanuatu as a minor subsistence food. Atactodea striata is harvested, mostly by women, by gleaning intertidal zones. Women fishers walk the shoreline and shallows collecting Atactodea along with a variety of other common clams, bivalves, crabs, chitons, sea slugs, anemone and octopus. [10] On Tarawa, indigenous people harvest Atactodea striata as a preferred baby food because of its small size. [7]
Clam is a common name for several kinds of bivalve molluscs. The word is often applied only to those that are edible and live as infauna, spending most of their lives halfway buried in the sand of the seafloor or riverbeds. Clams have two shells of equal size connected by two adductor muscles and have a powerful burrowing foot. They live in both freshwater and marine environments; in salt water they prefer to burrow down into the mud and the turbidity of the water required varies with species and location; the greatest diversity of these is in North America.
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