Physidae
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Physidae | ||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 |
||||||||||||||||
| Scientific classification | ||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||
| Subfamilies and genera | ||||||||||||||||
|
See text. |
Physidae, common name bladder snails, are a taxonomic family of small freshwater snails, aquatic pulmonate gastropod molluscs. Within this family, the shell is always sinistral, in other words it has left-handed coiling.
These snails eat algae, diatoms and other detritus.
Contents |
[edit] Shell description
These small snails are quite distinctive, because they have shells that are sinistral, which means that if you hold the shell such that the spire is pointing up, the aperture is on the left-hand side.
The shells of Physidae species have a long and large aperture, a pointed spire, and no operculum. The shells are thin and corneous and rather transparent.
[edit] Subfamilies and genera
- subfamily Physinae Fitzinger, 1833
- subfamily Aplexinae Starobogatov, 1967
- Aplexa Fleming, 1820 - aplexa
- subfamily ?
- Stenophysa von Martens, 1898
[edit] References
- Janus, Horst, 1965. ‘’The young specialist looks at land and freshwater molluscs’’, Burke, London
[edit] External links
 |
This Pulmonata-related article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. |
Wikimedia Commons has media related to:
