Neothauma
| Neothauma | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| shell of Neothauma tanganyicense | |
| Scientific classification | |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Mollusca |
| Class: | Gastropoda |
| (unranked): |
clade Caenogastropoda informal group Architaenioglossa |
| Superfamily: | Viviparoidea |
| Family: | Viviparidae |
| Genus: |
Neothauma E. A. Smith, 1880 |
| Species: | N. tanganyicense |
| Binomial name | |
|
Neothauma tanganyicense E. A. Smith, 1880 |
|
informal group Architaenioglossa
Neothauma tanganyicense is a species of freshwater snail with a gill and an operculum, an aquatic gastropod mollusc in the family Viviparidae.
This is the only species in the genus Neothauma.
This freshwater snail is only found in Lake Tanganyika, where it is the largest gastropod, and occurs in all four of the bordering countries — Burundi, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Tanzania, and Zambia — although fossil shells have been discovered at Lake Edward and in the Lake Albert basin.
The type locality is the East shore of Lake Tanganyika, at Ujiji.
The genus Neothauma previously contained several species, but most were reassigned to other genera.
The width of the shell is 46 mm. The height of the shell is 60 mm.
This species lives in depths of up to 65 m.
The shells of dead Neothauma tanganyicense often form carpets over large areas, and are used by a number of other animals, such as cichlid fish (shell dwellers), and freshwater crabs of the genus Platythelphusa. Juvenile snails live in the sediment in order to avoid predators.
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Wikipedia