Snail ID

[ritter6788]

I picked up a few of these in Galveston. I'm pretty sure they are whelks but I know different whelks prey on different things. They were on the rocks during high and low tide.

Any help on the ID would be greatly appreciated.

 

[pagojoe]

There's one in the pic (the one with the skinny ribs) that might actually be a true whelk, but most of them are Stramonita haemastoma floridana, which are predatory snails in the murex family. I think they are pretty neat, but they will eat barnacles, clams, and other snails, maybe including each other if they get really hungry. If you cleaned them up, the shells would look more or less like these:

http://www.gastropods.com/4/Shell_1904.shtml

Cheers,



Don

 

[ritter6788]

Thank you! Good info!