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The distinction is one of convenience only; it is not based on any clear biologically homologous trait, any more than the common trait of having wings functionally unites insects, bats, and birds, or than not having wings unites tortoises, snails and sponges. Being animals, invertebrates are heterotrophs, and require sustenance in the form of ...
A molluscivore is a carnivorous animal that specialises in feeding on molluscs such as gastropods, bivalves, brachiopods and cephalopods.Known molluscivores include numerous predatory (and often cannibalistic) molluscs, (e.g.octopuses, murexes, decollate snails and oyster drills), arthropods such as crabs and firefly larvae, and, vertebrates such as fish, birds and mammals. [1]
A snail is a shelled gastropod. The name is most often applied to land snails, terrestrial pulmonate gastropod molluscs. However, the common name snail is also used for most of the members of the molluscan class Gastropoda that have a coiled shell that is large enough for the animal to retract
Gastropods (/ ˈ ɡ æ s t r ə p ɒ d z /), commonly known as slugs and snails, belong to a large taxonomic class of invertebrates within the phylum Mollusca called Gastropoda (/ ɡ æ s ˈ t r ɒ p ə d ə /). This class comprises snails and slugs from saltwater, freshwater, and from the land.
Arthropoda is the largest animal phylum with the estimates of the number of arthropod species varying from 1,170,000 to 5~10 million and accounting for over 80 percent of all known living animal species.
The anatomy of a common air-breathing land snail: much of this anatomy does not apply to gastropods in other clades or groups. Snails are distinguished by an anatomical process known as torsion, where the visceral mass of the animal rotates 180° to one side during development, such that the anus is situated more or less above the head. This ...
The body is soft and slimy, brownish-grey, and able to be retracted entirely into the shell, which the animal does when inactive or threatened. When injured or badly irritated the snail produces a defensive froth of mucus that might repel some enemies or overwhelm aggressive small ants and the like.
The apple snail's usual enemies are the birds limpkin and snail kite. Apple snails inhabit various ecosystems: ponds, swamps and rivers. Although they occasionally leave the water, they spend most of their time under water. Unlike the pulmonate snail families, apple snails are not hermaphroditic, but gonochoristic; i.e. they have separate sexes.