- Source: Admete gracilior
Admete gracilior, common name the slender admete, is a species of sea snail, a marine gastropod mollusk in the family Cancellariidae, the nutmeg snails.
Description
The length of the shell varies between 7 mm and 12 mm.
(Described as Admete rhyssa) The small, white shell features an olive-colored outer layer called the periostracum, a loosely coiled (decorticated) protoconch, followed by approximately four distinct whorls separated by a distinct suture.
The axial sculpture consists of (on the body whorl a dozen) rather narrow, nearly vertical ribs, which extend from suture to suture along the spire and from the suture to the margin of the base in the body whorl, with wider spaces between. The incremental lines are rather marked. The spiral sculpture consists of (on the spire four, on the body whorl eight) prominent threads with wider interspaces, overriding the ribs and forming nodes where they intersect them. The base of the shell is nearly smooth except for one or two minor threads near the siphonal canal.
The aperture has a semilunate shape. The outer lip is thin. The body of the shell is covered with a thin layer of enamel. The columella shows three oblique plaits. The siphonal canal is shallow, short and contains a faint fasciole.
Distribution
This species occurs in the Pacific Ocean from the Aleutians to California, USA; also off Tierra del Fuego, Argentina and in the Ross Sea, Antarctica.
References
Dall, W.H. (1905) Some new species of mollusks from California. The Nautilus, 18, 123–125
McLean J.H. (1996). The Prosobranchia. In: Taxonomic Atlas of the Benthic Fauna of the Santa Maria Basin and Western Santa Barbara Channel. The Mollusca Part 2 – The Gastropoda. Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History. volume 9: 1–160
External links
Journal of the Washington Academy of Sciences vol. 46, 1956
Hemmen J. (2007) Recent Cancellariidae. Annotated and illustrated catalogue of Recent Cancellariidae. Privately published, Wiesbaden. 428 pp. [With amendments and corrections taken from Petit R.E. (2012) A critique of, and errata for, Recent Cancellariidae by Jens Hemmen, 2007. Conchologia Ingrata 9: 1–8