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Nassarius, common names nassa mud snails (USA) or dog whelks (UK), is a genus of sea snails, marine gastropod molluscs in the family Nassariidae, the nassa mud snails or dog whelks.
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Species within this genus are found worldwide.
These snails usually live on mud flats or sand flats, intertidally or subtidally.
Most Nassarius species are very active scavengers, feeding on such things as dead fish, etc. They often burrow into marine substrates and then wait with their siphons stuck out into the water until they smell nearby food.
These snails have oval shells with a relatively high spire and a siphonal notch.
The animal has a long siphon.
Nassarius vibex is a species often selected for marine aquaria. It is often confused with the Nassarius_obsoletus, which is a cooler water snail less suited to marine temperatures.
The shells of various species of Nassarius are popular with shell collectors, and are sometimes used in jewellry and other forms of decoration.
Several beads made from Nassarius gibbosulus shells are thought to be the earliest known forms of personal adornment, or even jewelry. Two shell beads found in Skhul Cave on the slopes of Mount Carmel, Israel are thought to be 100,000 years old, whilst another found at Oued Djebbana, Algeria is believed to be 90,000 years old. A further group of pierced shells, some with red ochre, has been recovered from the Aterian levels at Grotte des Pigeons, Taforalt, Morocco; these Nassarius gibbosulus beads have been securely dated to about 82,000 years ago Bouzouggar, A., Barton, N., Vanhaeren, M., d\'Errico, F., Collcutt, S., Higham, T., Hodge, E., Parfitt, S., Rhodes, E., Schwenninger, J.-L., Stringer, C., Turner, E., Ward, S., Moutmir, A. and Stambouli, A. 2007. "82,000-year-old shell beads from North Africa and implications for the origins of modern human behavior" Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, June 4, 2007; http://www.pnas.org/cgi/content/abstract/0703877104v1. All these examples predate several 75,000 year old Nassarius kraussianus beads found at Blombos Cave, South Africa, also including some colored with red ochre, that were previously thought to be the oldest examples of jewelry. Study reveals \'oldest jewellery\', BBC News, 22 June 2006
75,000 year old Nassarius shell beads found in South Africa
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