Aciculidae

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Aciculidae
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Mollusca
Class: Gastropoda
Subclass: Orthogastropoda
Superorder: Caenogastropoda
Order: Sorbeoconcha
Suborder: Hypsogastropoda
Infraorder: Littorinimorpha
Family: Aciculidae
J. E. Gray, 1850

The Aciculidae are a family of minute land snails which have opercula. (An operculum is a little door that closes the shell when the animal retracts into it.) In other words, Aciculidae are terrestrial operculate gastropods. They have sometimes been described as "winkles come ashore".

Even though Aciculidae are land snails, they live in rather wet conditions, among mosses and dead leaves.

In the Taxonomy of the Gastropoda (Bouchet & Rocroi, 2005) the family Aciculidae has been reassigned to the superfamily Cyclophoroidea of the informal group Architaenioglossa, belonging to the clade Caenogastropoda.

[edit] Genera

  • Acicula W. Hartmann, 1821
  • Menkia Boeters, E. Gittenberger & Subai, 1985
  • Platyla Moquin-Tandon, 1856
  • Renea Nevill, 1880

[edit] References

  • Horst Janus, 1965. The Young Specialist Looks at Land and Freshwater Molluscs, Burke, London
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