Download the entire report in Shells
Examples of shells were collected during excavation; although many of the species represented have large ranges, all of them are also native to Pensacola Bay. The samples come from the phylum Mollusca. There are 184 species of mollusks native to the bay, including 96 from the class Gastropoda, and 80 from the class Bivalvia (Cooley 1978:17). All of the samples in the collection come from these two classes. By far the most common bivalve is the ubquitous oyster. At least three species are present including the Common Oyster (Cassostrea virginica), the Crested Oyster (Ostrea equestris), and an unidentified species, possibly Coon Oyster (Ostrea frons). Other bivalves include Southern Quahog (Mercenarius mercenarius), Common Cockle (Trachycardium muricatum), Disk Shell (Dosinia discus), Elegant Disk Shell (Dosinia elegens), Mottled Chione (Chione intepupurea), Cross-barred Chione (Chione cancellata), Ponderous Ark (Noetia ponderousa), and Vanhyning’s Heart Cockle (Dinocardium robustum vanhyningi) (Morris 1975).
Gastropods range in size from a large Lightning Welk (Busycon contarium) 25 centimeters in length to a tiny Olive Nerite (Neritina reclivata) only 8 millimeters in diameter. Between these two extremes are the Florida Rock Shell (Thais haemastoma floridana), Hay’s Rock Shell?? (Thais haemastoma canaliculata), the Florida Cerith (Cerithium floridana), The Florida Auger (Terebra floridana), the Common Eastern Nassa or Mottled Dog Welk (Nassarius Vibex), and a species of Tagelus.
All the samples in the collection vary from the average to the smalles of the sizes given for their respective species. This may indicate a degredation of the environment of Pensacola Bay to an extent that few individuals reach adult size.