Littorina saxatilis

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Rough periwinkle
Littorina saxatilis 01.JPG
A shell of Littorina saxatilis
Scientific classification OOjs UI icon edit-ltr.svg
Domain: Eukaryota
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Mollusca
Class: Gastropoda
Subclass: Caenogastropoda
Order: Littorinimorpha
Family: Littorinidae
Genus: Littorina
Species:
L. saxatilis
Binomial name
Littorina saxatilis
(Olivi, 1792) [1]

Littorina saxatilis, common name the rough periwinkle, is a species of small sea snail, a marine gastropod mollusc in the family Littorinidae, the winkles or periwinkles. First identified in the 1700s, it has been misidentified as a new species 112 times. [2]

Contents

Distribution

This species is native to the shores of the North Atlantic Ocean, including Hudson Bay, Baffin Island, Greenland, and the Barents Sea, south along the American East Coast to Chesapeake Bay, and along the European coast to the Straits of Gibraltar.

This species has also been introduced to San Francisco Bay, on the West Coast of the United States, where it was first observed in 1992.

Shell description

The shell in life often appears green with algae, but the shell itself can be white, red, or brown, sometimes with checkered lines. The shell has 4–5 whorls. Maximum recorded shell length is 19 mm. [3] [4]

Ecology

Habitat

This species frequently lives in salt marshes. it can also be found in crevices of intertidal bedrock, in empty barnacle shells, and under rocks. Like many other periwinkles, this species can survive long exposures out of the water.[ citation needed ]

The species has been recorded alive from depth range 0 – 46 m [3] or up to 183 m (for shells only). [4]

In the exposed Galician coast in the Northern Spain, two well differentiated ecotypes are adapted to different shore levels and habitats. [5] The RB ecotype (Ridged and Banded) lives on barnacles in the upper shore. [5] This ecotype displays a larger and more robust shell to resist the attack from predators such as crabs, and a smaller shell aperture in order to reduce the desiccation due to high sunshine exposure. [5] The SU ecotype (Smooth and Unbanded) is found at the lower shore living on mussels. [5] This ecotype shows a smaller and thinner shell with a wider shell aperture to allocate a relatively larger muscular foot providing a higher ability to avoid the dislodgment caused by the heavy wave action. [5] Both ecotypes coexist in an intermediate habitat at the middle shore. [5]

Genetics

Littorina saxatilis has been shown to be an excellent model system for speciation genetics. [6] In the seminal 2001 paper, Wilding et al demonstrated, using amplified fragment length polymorphism, that the low shore M form of the species were divergent from the high shore H form at number of loci despite gene flow between the forms. [6]

Feeding habits

This snail is a herbivore which grazes on the surface of rocks and mud flats.

Life cycle

The marine snail Littorina saxatilis has separate sexes, internal fertilization, and a brood pouch with non-planktonic shelled embryos. [5]

Synonyms

See also

Related Research Articles

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References

This article incorporates CC-BY-2.0 text from the reference [5] [6]

  1. ↑ Olivi G. (1792). Zoologia Adriatica, ossia catalogo ragionato degli animali del golfo e della lagune di Venezia. Bassano, Venecia [ix] + 334 + xxxii pp., 9 pls.
  2. ↑ Feltman, Rachel (March 12, 2015). "Nearly 200,000 'new' marine species turn out to be duplicates". The Washington Post.
  3. 1 2 Littorina saxatilis (Olivi) Malacolog 4.1.1. A Database of Western Atlantic Marine Mollusca.
  4. 1 2 Welch J. J. (2010). "The "Island Rule" and Deep-Sea Gastropods: Re-Examining the Evidence". PLoS ONE 5(1): e8776. doi : 10.1371/journal.pone.0008776.
  5. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 Martínez-Fernández M., Bernatchez L., Rolán-Alvarez E. & Quesada H. (2010). "Insights into the role of differential gene expression on the ecological adaptation of the snail Littorina saxatilis". BMC Evolutionary Biology 10: 356. doi : 10.1186/1471-2148-10-356.
  6. 1 2 3 Wilding C. S., Butlin R. K. & Grahame J. (2001). "Differential gene expression between parapatric morphs of Littorina saxatilis detected using RFLP markers". Journal of Evolutionary Biology 14: 4. doi : 10.1046/j.1420-9101.2001.00304.x.

Further reading

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