Red shellfish - Pharaonella sieboldii

Japanese: ベニガイ(紅貝) - ベニガイ（英語表記）Pharaonella sieboldii

A beautifully colored bivalve of the family Day Gastropodidae (illustration). The shell is 5.5 cm long, 2.2 cm high, and 0.8 cm bulged. It looks like a larger version of the cherry shell of the same family. The shell is thin, flat, and elongated oval from front to back. It is red in color, but sometimes white. It has weak growth veins and is shiny. The teeth where the two shells interlock on the inside are small, and the mantle line is deeply indented. It is widely distributed in the Pacific Ocean from the Tsugaru Strait to Kyushu and Okinawa south, and lives on fine sandy bottoms from the intertidal zone to depths of about 10 m. It burrows into the sand with the left shell facing down, and a long, thin water inlet and outlet tube emerges from the rear end.

Source: Heibonsha World Encyclopedia, 2nd Edition Information

Japanese:

美しい色のニッコウガイ科の二枚貝（イラスト）。殻の長さ5.5cm，高さ2.2cm，膨らみ0.8cm。同科のサクラガイを大きくした感じ。殻は薄く，扁平で前後に長卵形である。紅色であるが，ときに白色のものもある。成長脈は弱く，光沢がある。内面の両殻のかみ合せの歯は小さく，外套（がいとう）線の湾入は深い。津軽海峡より九州･沖縄以南の太平洋に広く分布し，潮間帯から水深10mくらいの細砂底にすむ。左殻を下にして砂に潜り，後端から細く長い出入水管を出す。

出典　株式会社平凡社世界大百科事典第２版について　情報

<<: Stump-tailed macaque (Macaca arctoides) (M. speciosa)

>>: Colossendeis colossea (English name: Colossendeis colossea)