Melo (gastropod)
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| A shell of the , Melo melo surrounded by a group of pearls from that species | |
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| Superfamily: | Muricoidea
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| Genus: | Melo |
Melo is a genus of extremely large sea snails, marine gastropod molluscs in the family Volutidae, the volutes. Because of their huge ovate shells, these snails are often known as "bailers" (the shells were sometimes used for bailing out canoes) or "melons" (because the shell resembles that fruit).
Species in this genus sometimes produce large pearls. The image in the taxobox shows a group of these pearls with a shell of the species Melo melo.
Species[]
Species in the genus Melo include:
- Melo aethiopica (Linnaeus, 1758)
- Melo amphora, (Lightfoot, 1786) Giant baler
- Melo ashmorensis Morrison, 2005
- Melo broderipii (Griffith, E. & E. Pidgeon, 1834)
- Melo georginae (Griffith, E. & E. Pidgeon, 1834)
- Melo melo (Lightfoot, 1786)
- Melo miltonis (Griffith, E. & E. Pidgeon, 1834) or Southern bailer
- (Lamarck, 1822)
- Melo umbilicatus (Broderip in Sowerby, 1826) or umbilicate melon
Gallery[]
Video of a live individual of Melo amphora crawling at low tide |
 A live individual of what is probably Melo umbilicatus |
 A shell of Melo aethiopica |
 A shell of Melo melo |
 A juvenile shell of what is probably Melo amphora |
Ecology[]
Parasites of Melo sp. include trematode .[2]
References[]
- ^ Broderip W. (1826). In: Sowerby, Gen. Shells, (28).
- ^ Alevs, Philippe V.; Vieira, Fabiano M.; Santos, Cláudia P.; Scholz, Tomáš; Luque, José L. (2015-02-12). "A Checklist of the Aspidogastrea (Platyhelminthes: Trematoda) of the World". Zootaxa. 3918 (3): 339–96. doi:10.11646/zootaxa.3918.3.2. ISSN 1175-5334. PMID 25781098.
External links[]
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Wikimedia Commons has media related to Melo (genus). |
Categories:
- Volutidae
- Gastropod genera
- Taxa named by William Broderip
- Volutidae stubs