Euplica scripta

Euplica scripta
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Mollusca
Class:	Gastropoda
(unranked):	clade Caenogastropoda clade Hypsogastropoda clade Neogastropoda
Superfamily:	Buccinoidea
Family:	Columbellidae
Genus:	Euplica
Species:	E. scripta
Binomial name
Euplica scripta (Lamarck, 1822)
Synonyms[1]
Buccinum flexuosum Lamarck, 1822 Columbella araneosa Kiener, 1841 Columbella atladona Duclos, 1835 Columbella collaris Reeve, 1859 Columbella cornea Kiener, 1841 Columbella coronata Duclos, 1835 Columbella deveyrai Bartsch, 1918 Columbella idulia Duclos, 1835 Columbella nivosa Reeve, 1859 Columbella ouveensis Hervier, R.P.J., 1899 Columbella perlaevis G.B. Sowerby III, 1905 Columbella rasotia Duclos, 1835 Columbella scripta Lamarck, 1822 Columbella tigrina Duclos, 1835 Columbella versicolor G.B. Sowerby I, 1832 Columbella versicolor var. hebridarum Hervier, 1899 Columbella versicolor var. ouveensis Hervier, 1899 Euplica versicolor (G. B. Sowerby I, 1832) Mitrella (Mitrella) flexuosa Lamarck, J.B.P.A. de, 1822 Pyrene versicolor Sowerby, G.B. I, 1832 Voluta nasuta Gmelin, 1790

Euplica scripta, common name : the dotted dove shell, is a species of sea snail, a marine gastropod mollusk in the family Columbellidae, the dove snails.^[1]

Description

The shell size varies between 9 mm and 22 mm

The oblong shell is subfusiform. The spire is turreted, conical and pointed. It is composed of seven or eight folded whorls, often tuberculated. The upper edge of each whorl is very slightly compressed, which renders the sutures but little apparent. The body whorl, with neither folds nor tubercles, is as large as all the others together, and striated at the base. The ground color of this shell is whitish, and there are delineated brown undulating or zigzag lines, more or less numerous, which descend from the top to the base of the whorls. Sometimes other bands upon the upper whorls form delicate rhombs. The aperture is rather narrow, attenuated at its lower extremity, and as long as the other whorls united. The columella is smooth, straight and entirely white like the rest of the interior of the aperture. The outer lip is indistinctly crenulated. ^[2]

Distribution

This species is distributed over the entire Indo-Pacific and off Sri Lanka, Vietnam and Australia.

References

1. Euplica scripta (Lamarck, 1822) .  Retrieved through: World Register of Marine Species on 6 November 2010.
2. Kiener (1840). General species and iconography of recent shells : comprising the Massena Museum, the collection of Lamarck, the collection of the Museum of Natural History, and the recent discoveries of travellers; Boston :W.D. Ticknor,1837 (described as Buccinum flexuosum Lamarck, 1822)

• Dautzenberg, Ph. (1929). Mollusques testaces marins de Madagascar. Faune des Colonies Francaises, Tome III

External links

• Gastropods.com : Euplica scripta; accessed : 6 November 2010