Serpulorbis

Serpulorbis
View of the shell of a live individual of Serpulorbis squamiger
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Mollusca
Class:	Gastropoda
(unranked):	clade Caenogastropoda clade Hypsogastropoda clade Littorinimorpha
Superfamily:	Vermetoidea
Family:	Vermetidae
Genus:	Serpulorbis Sassi, 1827 [1]
Species
See text

Serpulorbis is a genus of sea snails known as worm shells or worm snails. These are marine gastropod molluscs in the family Vermetidae, the wormsnails. Unlike some other vermetids, the species in this genus have no operculum.

Serpulorbis snails have shells which are long and irregular. They do not have regular coiling like that of a typical gastropod shell, and they are usually cemented onto a hard surface. Because of all this, the shells resemble the calcareous tubes of certain marine worms, for example worms in the polychaete family Serpulidae.

Species

According to the World Register of Marine Species (WoRMS), the following species with valid names are included within the genus Serpulorbis :^[2]

• Serpulorbis aotearoicus Morton, 1951
• Serpulorbis arenarius (Linnaeus, 1767)
• Serpulorbis colubrinus (Röding, 1798)
• Serpulorbis decussatus (Gmelin, 1791) - decussate wormsnail
• Serpulorbis inopertus (Rüppell & Leuckart, 1830)
• Serpulorbis natalensis Mörch, 1862
• Serpulorbis riisei (Mörch, 1862)
• Serpulorbis sipho (Lamarck, 1818)
• Serpulorbis squamigerus (Carpenter, 1856) - scaled wormsnail
• Serpulorbis squamolineatus Petuch, 2002
• Serpulorbis zelandicus (Quoy and Gaimard, 1834)
• Serpulorbis panamensis (Chenu, 1838) (species inquirenda = a species of doubtful identity needing further investigation)

References

• "Serpulorbis". Integrated Taxonomic Information System. 
• Powell A. W. B., New Zealand Mollusca, William Collins Publishers Ltd, Auckland, New Zealand 1979 ISBN 0-00-216906-1