Carinate Tropid Snail

Trophidophora Carinata

This reconstruction stands for the many extinct species of molluscs devastated by the introduction to Mauritius of a large carnivorous snail.

It was a large, ornate, forest dwelling species that grazed on algae on rocks and leaves. Washed down the rivers, the fine angular spiral shell of this land snail still occasionally found in sandy dunes. The reconstruction is based on such shells and on the snail’s closest living relative on Rodrigues.