Puperita pupa

Housing of Puperita pupa

Puperita pupa is a living in salt water and brackish water snail from the family of Kahn snails ( Neritidae ), which belongs to the order of Neritomorpha. It is common in coastal areas and the islands of the western Atlantic, especially the Caribbean. The Zebra mermaids also called worm worm differs from the other zebra racing snails so-called clear by their black and white coloring.

Features

The spherical, lackluster housing of Puperita pupa, which is up to 13 mm in adult snails and reached a diameter 8-14 mm, smooth or has especially towards the front weak growth lines. The thread protrudes slightly, is flat on top and a little edgy. The seam is torn in places and rises forward greatly reduced. The case mouth is a little crooked and orange more or less pale. The separated above and below by a distinct furrow of the Columellarfläche outer edge is rounded, emarginate, the inner edge weakly and staffed with about 5 small teeth. The Columellarfläche is small, flat, whitish, yellow back, topless clear boundary and bounded below by a semi-circular edge. The muscle strip is poorly developed or absent.

Has the dull surface of the housing on the white ground color black welts that are more or less in small or large numbers run arching and usually also connected among themselves. They extend along the growth lines or something further back, rarely further forward. The welts are connected by a zigzag course or ramifications. New welts are branches or start over. In part, irregular form networks of black lines. There is a smooth transition into shapes with white drops and three zones of greater white spots on a black background, which used as a separate species Puperita tristis (originally Neritina tristis d' Orb. Vs. Neritina pupa L.) have been described. Through experiments, it was shown that these are animals of the same species, which develop differently depending on the environmental conditions. Animals that live in salt water, forming white case with black line drawing, while black housing with white dots are formed in brackish water.

The operculum is on both sides of pale orange and light brown on bottom hem. The inner edge has a blunt, wide projection. The hot compressed rib is pale. The pin is very wrong, as high and intense yellow.

Geographical distribution

Puperita pupa is distributed in the salt water on the coasts and islands of the western Atlantic and in the brackish waters of estuaries, as in the Caribbean, Florida, the Bahamas, the Cayman Islands, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cuba, Gulf of Mexico, Hispaniola, Jamaica, the Lesser Antilles, Mexico and San Andres (Colombia ).

Habitat and behavior

Puperita pupa lives on the coast in the intertidal zone on rocks that are exposed to the surf, tide pools with constant salinity or at times, very high salinity due to evaporation and in brackish water and in pools containing by rainfall almost fresh water.

The worm is active during the day at high tide. Drying out of the tide pools or very warm, the snails leave sometimes in greater numbers the water.

Puperita pupa is like all snails Kahn dioecious. The male mated the female with his penis. The female attached to hard substrate egg capsules, each containing about 15 fertile eggs. The development proceeds through a free-swimming veliger larvae and subsequent metamorphosis to produce snails.

Puperita pupa feed on diatoms and cyanobacteria in particular that grow on the surface of the rocks.