THE LUCINAS - FAMILY LUCINIDAE. Shellcircular, equivalve, with small, depressed beaks and distinct lunule; hinge teeth, cardinals two, laterals two, or tooth less. Animal without siphons; foot very long, vermiform, hollow; two or four gills, often modified into brood chambers, their tissues occupied by eggs. A tropical family living in sandy mud, well represented on our own warm coasts by shells handsomely sculp tured with ribs or lattice work.
Genus LUCINA, Brug.
Characters of the family.
The Tiger Lucina (L. tigrina, Linn.) has fine concentric ridges crossing paired ridges that radiate from the beaks. The valves are ventricose, solid and white. The long foot is folded upon itself and concealed between the gills. Diameter, 3 inches.
Habitat. Florida to Texas.
The Florida Lucina (L. Floridana, Conr.) is an exceedingly abundant species on shallow, protected sand flats. The rough surface is dingy white, the growth lines yellow. The minute beaks point forward. Diameter, I inch.
Habitat. West coast of Florida and Keys.
A deep water species, L. filosa, Stimps., is found all along our Atlantic coast. It is overlaid with elegant growth ridges. Diameter, 2 inches.
L. Pennsylvanica, Linn., wears a wrinkled epidermis which gives it a ribbed appearance and a yellow colour, though the valves are white, and ridged only on the large lunule. The dis tinguishing characters are the diagonal furrows which bound the posterior area, as angular ridges do in many species. Diam eter, 2 inches.
Habitat. Cape Hatteras, Florida coast, West Indies.
366 The Lucinas L. dentata, Wood, has onlique lineations on the concentric belts of surface separated by the remote growth lines. The mar gins are toothed. The beaks are elevated, central, often cor roded. Diameter, i inch.
Habitat. Cape Hatteras to deep water.
Habitat. Southern California.
The California Lucina (L. Calif ornica, Conr.) is an abundant little bivalve, circular, with fine concentric lines, and the lunule wholly on the right valve. The lateral hinge teeth are stronger than the cardinals, and the ligament is external. Diameter, to i inches.
Habitat. California.
A deep water species of the northwest strongly resembles L. filosa, of the Atlantic side of the continent. It is L. acuti lineata, Conr. Diameter, 2i inches.
Habitat Sitka to San Pedro Bay, Cal.
Professor Keep gives preference to the generic name, Pha coides, of Blainville, with Lucina as a synonym. Lucina is the more familiar name.
Genus LORIPES, Poli This genus is represented on the Florida Keys and on our whole gulf coast by a deep water species, L. edentula, Linn., whose empty valves are cast ashore by storms. Cape Hatteras is its northern station. The large, circular valves are rather ventricose, finely scored by close growth lines, white outside and bright yellow within. The teeth and ligaments are very weak, and it is almost impossible to find mates among the hundreds of shells one has to choose from on the beaches of western Florida.
The children use these dainty little "buttercups" in setting the table in playhouses. The rich colour that rises almost to the rim suggests nothing more than melted butter. Diameter, 21 inches.
Genus SOLENOMYA, Lam.
Shell obliquely elongated, equivalve, resembling a razor clam; fingers of horny periostracum prolong the ribs of the shell con siderably beyond its margin; ligament internal, hinge without teeth; mantle closed except where the siphon and foot emerge; foot snout-like, with a toothed disk at the end; siphon with two long tentacles at orifice. A single genus of few species in the family.
The Little Solenomya (S. velum, Say), unmistakable with its notched or fingered extension of horny epidermis over-reaching the plain shell margins, has broad, flat ridges radiating from its hinge at one corner of the oblong shell. Length scarcely an inch.
Habitat. Nova Scotia to Cape Hatteras.
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