''Drupa morum'',

common name In biology, a common name of a taxon or organism (also known as a vernacular name, English name, colloquial name, country name, popular name, or farmer's name) is a name that is based on the normal language of everyday life; and is often contrast ...

the purple drupe, is a

species In biology, a species is the basic unit of classification and a taxonomic rank of an organism, as well as a unit of biodiversity. A species is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriate s ...

sea snail Sea snail is a common name for slow-moving marine gastropod molluscs, usually with visible external shells, such as whelk or abalone. They share the taxonomic class Gastropoda with slugs, which are distinguished from snails primarily by the ...

, a marine

gastropod The gastropods (), commonly known as snails and slugs, belong to a large taxonomic class of invertebrates within the phylum Mollusca called Gastropoda (). This class comprises snails and slugs from saltwater, from freshwater, and from land. T ...

mollusk Mollusca is the second-largest phylum of invertebrate animals after the Arthropoda, the members of which are known as molluscs or mollusks (). Around 85,000 extant species of molluscs are recognized. The number of fossil species is e ...

in the

family Family (from la, familia) is a Social group, group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or Affinity (law), affinity (by marriage or other relationship). The purpose of the family is to maintain the well-being of its ...

Muricidae, the murex snails or rock snails.

Subspecies

* ''Drupa morum iodostoma'' (Lesson, 1840) (synonym : ''Purpura (Ricinula) iodostoma'' Lesson, 1840 ) (''species inquirenda'') * ''Drupa morum morum'' Röding, 1798 (synonyms : ''Canrena neritoidea'' Link, 1807; ''Drupa horrida'' (Lamarck, 1816), ''Drupa morum'' Röding, 1798, ''Drupa (Drupa) morum morum'' Röding, 1798; ''Drupa violacea'' (Schumacher, 1817); ''Ricinella violacea'' Schumacher, 1817; ''Ricinula globosa'' Mörch, 1852; ''Ricinula horrida'' Lamarck, 1816) Drupa morum 002

Description

Thick, globose shell, up to 5 cm, with low

spire A spire is a tall, slender, pointed structure on top of a roof of a building or tower, especially at the summit of church steeples. A spire may have a square, circular, or polygonal plan, with a roughly conical or pyramidal shape. Spires are ...

, large

body whorl The body whorl is part of the morphology of the shell in those gastropod mollusks that possess a coiled shell. The term is also sometimes used in a similar way to describe the shell of a cephalopod mollusk. In gastropods In gastropods, the b ...

and flat base. Colour white with dark brown nodules. Dark violet, narrow

aperture In optics, an aperture is a hole or an opening through which light travels. More specifically, the aperture and focal length of an optical system determine the cone angle of a bundle of rays that come to a focus in the image plane. An opt ...

with conspicuous groups of denticles. Columella with three strong, plicate ridges.

Distribution

''Drupa morum'' lives in the Indo-Pacific. *

Aldabra Aldabra is the world's second-largest coral atoll, lying south-east of the continent of Africa. It is part of the Aldabra Group of islands in the Indian Ocean that are part of the Outer Islands of the Seychelles, with a distance of 1,120 k ...

(from invalid distribution) * Chagos (from invalid distribution) * Kenya (from invalid distribution) * Madagascar * Mascarene Basin (from invalid distribution) * Mauritius (from invalid distribution) * Red Sea (from invalid distribution) * Tanzania

Habitat

Habitat of ''Drupa morum'' include rocky shores and in crevices among lower eulittoral rocks.

References

* Spry, J.F. (1961). ''The sea shells of Dar es Salaam: Gastropods''. Tanganyika Notes and Records 56 * Dautzenberg, Ph. (1929). ''Mollusques testaces marins de Madagascar''. Faune des Colonies Francaises, Tome III * Houart R., Kilburn R.N. & Marais A.P. (2010) ''Muricidae''. pp. 176–270, in: Marais A.P. & Seccombe A.D. (eds), Identification guide to the seashells of South Africa. Volume 1. Groenkloof: Centre for Molluscan Studies. 376 pp. * Claremont M., Reid D.G. & Williams S.T. (2012) ''Speciation and dietary specialization in Drupa, a genus of predatory marine snails (Gastropoda: Muricidae)''. Zoologica Scripta 41: 137–149.

External links

* {{Taxonbar, from=Q5309366

morum ''Morum'' is a genus of sea snails, marine gastropod mollusks in the subfamily Moruminae of the family Harpidae.MolluscaBase (2018). ''Morum'' Röding, 1798. Accessed through: World Register of Marine Species at: http://www.marinespecies.org/ap ...

Gastropods described in 1798