Fossariidae

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Fossariidae

Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Mollusca
Class:	Gastropoda
Order:	Mesogastropoda
Family:	Fossariidae

Genera

See text.

Fossariidae are a family of small sea snails, marine gastropod molluscs in the order Mesogastropoda.

[edit] Description

The shells are of varying shape, some elongated, rissoid-like, others turbinate, with rapidly enlarging whorls. The sculpture varies from smooth to strongly spirally ridged. The aperture is entire, with the inner lip separated from the body whorl by a cleft, in the tall narrow forms, but widely umbilicated in turbinate shells. The central tooth of the radula has a large middle cusp flanked by small denticles, lateral similarly toothed but transversely elongated, with a long handle-like base, and the paired marginals are long, narrow, curved and finely dentate.