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A live individual of Meghimatium fruhstorferi in the wild. Philomycidae are a family of air-breathing land slugs (snails without shells or with only shell remnants). They are terrestrial pulmonate gastropod mollusks in the superfamily Arionoidea (according to the taxonomy of the Gastropoda by Bouchet & Rocroi, 2005).
Snails can be found in a very wide range of environments, including ditches, deserts, and the abyssal depths of the sea. Although land snails may be more familiar to laymen, marine snails constitute the majority of snail species, and have much greater diversity and a greater biomass. Numerous kinds of snail can also be found in fresh water.
The shells of sea snails are often found washed up on beaches. Because many are attractive and durable, they have been used to make necklaces and other jewelry since prehistoric times. The shells of a few species of large sea snails within the Vetigastropoda have a thick layer of nacre and have been used as a source of mother of pearl.
Some shell shapes are found more often in certain environments, though there are many exceptions. Wave-washed high-energy environments, such as the rocky intertidal zone, are usually inhabited by snails whose shells have a wide aperture, a relatively low surface area, and a high growth rate per revolution. High-spired and highly sculptured ...
Although the name "snail" can be, and often is, applied to all the members of this class, commonly this word means only those species with an external shell big enough that the soft parts can withdraw completely into it. Slugs are gastropods that have no shell or a very small, internal shell; semislugs are gastropods that have a shell that they ...
Gastropods with protective shells are referred to as snails , whereas gastropods without protective shells are referred to as slugs . Gastropods are by far the most numerous molluscs in terms of classified species, accounting for 80% of the total. [25]
A slug on a wall in Kanagawa, Japan.. Slug, or land slug, is a common name for any apparently shell-less terrestrial gastropod mollusc.The word slug is also often used as part of the common name of any gastropod mollusc that has no shell, a very reduced shell, or only a small internal shell, particularly sea slugs and semi-slugs (this is in contrast to the common name snail, which applies to ...
The width of the shell is 9.80–40.02 mm (0.39–1.58 in); [2] the maximum width of the shell reaches 45.5 millimetres (1.79 in). [2] The average width of the shell of adult snails is 32 mm. [2] The average shell width in the Solitaire population was slightly less than that in the Kairei population. [15]