Violet Snails


Photo: Bill Rudman

Violet Snails – Janthina spp.

Order: Sorbeoconcha (Neotaenioglossa)
Superfamily: Janthinoidea
Family: Janthinidae

The Violet Snail, Janthina, with its float of mucus bubbles floating alongside the siphonophore Physalia on which it feeds.

Often washed up on beaches as empty shells, Violet Snails spend their lives floating at the surface of the open ocean, feeding on the Bluebottle Physalia, and related cnidarians. It floats by producing a mass of mucous bubbles which harden into a bubbleplastic-like float.

I suppose there are far worse ways to spend one’s days.

One thought on “Violet Snails

  1. Seems like a perfect model for a house, or a small city, a kind of post-apocalyptic polynesia of eating flowery tasting bacteria
    cakes and sunbathing
    amidst a dead but ultimately more peaceful world.. utopia as a purple polyp singing in the ruins..

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