Munditiella qualum

Munditiella qualum
Original drawing with three views of a shell of Munditiella qualum
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Mollusca
Class:	Gastropoda
Clade:	Vetigastropoda
Superfamily:	Trochoidea
Family:	Skeneidae
Genus:	Munditiella
Species:	M. qualum
Binomial name
Munditiella qualum (Hedley, 1899)
Synonyms
Teinostoma qualum Hedley, 1899 Teinostoma qualum var. paucicostatum Hedley, 1899

Munditiella qualum is a species of minute sea snail, a marine gastropod mollusk in the family Skeneidae.^[1]

Description

The height of the shell is 0.75 mm, its diameter 1.8 mm. The white shell has a scarcely elevated spire. It is widely umbilicated. The three whorls are flattened below the suture. They are rounded at the periphery and co,cave at the base. The body whorl is ornamented with twenty, broad, squarely projecting, transverse ribs. These arise at a distance from the suture, enlarge to the periphery and continue to the basal angle. These ribs vanish on the penultimate whorl. Close, regular and fine, raised spiral lines cover the whole shell, crossing the ribs and interstices alike. These are in their turn overridden by transverse microscopic threads. The base of the shell is excavate in the centre. The umbilicus measures one-fifth of the shell's diameter, exhibiting the previous whorls. The aperture is round. The outer lip is thickened, above spreading on the previous whorl and at the base projecting a callus tongue into the umbilicus.^[2]

Distribution

This species occurs in the Pacific Ocean off Indo-Malaysia, the Western Pacific and off Tuvalu; off Queensland, Australia.

References

• Hedley, C. 1899. The Mollusca of Funafuti. Part 1. Gastropoda. Memoirs of the Australian Museum 3(7): 395-488
• Hedley, C. 1907. Mollusca of Mast Head Reef, Queensland. Part 2. Proceedings of the Linnean Society of New South Wales. 32 : 476-513, pls 16-21