When I examined them again yeaterday, the smaller one had sealed its aperture with an epiphragm. ❋ AYDIN (2009)
SNAIL'S TALES: Cepaea nemoralis and its epiphragm skip to main ❋ AYDIN (2009)
There is only a very narrow, short gap, visible at the top corner of the epiphragm, that the snail may have left open for air exchange, although I am not sure if it goes all the way thru the epiphragm to the other side. ❋ AYDIN (2007)
Its aperture is almost perfectly sealed by its calcerous epiphragm. ❋ AYDIN (2007)
After all, the shell is a hard solid structure that in most cases envelopes the entire snail and the aperture could be blocked by an epiphragm or by various folds and lamellae here is an example. ❋ AYDIN (2006)
I wouldn't have expected a snail that is supposed to have originated in southeast Asia to build a similar epiphragm. ❋ AYDIN (2006)
What struck me as odd was that they had their apertures sealed with a hard calcareous epiphragm as opposed to a membranous one observed in eastern U.S. snails that normally don't experience long dry periods. ❋ AYDIN (2006)
In an another post, I remarked about the differences between the epiphragm of snails from California and Maryland. ❋ AYDIN (2006)
The snail pictured below still had its epiphragm intact, which was actually transparent, but in the picture reflected light makes it look shiny. ❋ AYDIN (2006)
In _Polytrichum_ a membranous epiphragm stretches across the wide mouth of the capsule between the tips of the short peristome teeth, and closes the opening except for the interspaces of the peristome. ❋ Various (N/A)
So, in the season of intense heat, the _Helix Waltoni_ of Ceylon, and others of the same family, before retiring under cover, close the aperture of their shells with an impervious epiphragm, which effectually protects their moisture and juices from evaporation during the period of their æstivation. ❋ James Emerson Tennent (1836)
The Bulimi of Chili have been found alive in England in a box packed in cotton after an interval of two years, and the animal inhabiting a land-shell from Suez, which was attached to a tablet and deposited in the British Museum in 1846, was found in 1850 to have formed a fresh epiphragm, and on being immersed in tepid water, it emerged from its shell. ❋ James Emerson Tennent (1836)
The insects, deprived of their accustomed food, disappear underground or hide beneath the decaying bark; the water-beetles bury themselves in the hardened mud of the pools, and the _helices_ retire into the crevices of the stones or the hollows amongst the roots of the trees, closing the apertures of their shells with the hybernating epiphragm. ❋ James Emerson Tennent (1836)
