The large shell with a single row of prominent upward-pointing spines on the whorl shoulder, thick black periostracum, and decollate spire are characteristic for this species.
Thiara amarula (Linnaeus, 1758)
Common name: Spined marsh snail
Class Gastropoda
Infraclass Caenogastropoda
Megaorder Cerithiimorpha
Order Cerithiida
Superfamily Cerithioidea
Family Thiaridae
Original name: Helix amarula Linnaeus, 1758. In Linnaeus, C. (1758). Systema Naturae, per regna tria naturae, secundum classes, ordines, genera, species, cum characteribus, differentiis, synonymis, locis. Editio decima, reformata. Holmiae : Laurentii Salvii Tom. 1 824 pp.
Type locality: Asian waters (Asiae fluviis).
Synonyms: Melania coacta Mörch, 1872; Melania cybele Gould, 1847; Melania diadema I Lee & H. C. Lee, 1851; Melania villosa Philippi, 1849.
Burrows in sediment and gravel in cool running freshwater streams in tropical rainforest areas in the reaches above tidal influence. Biology unstudied, but presumably a detritus feeder. Brood pouch in head; swimming veliger larvae released (Schütt & Glaubrecht, 1999).
Tropical north-eastern Queensland in streams and rivers. It also occurs from the southern and eastern coasts of Africa to the Malay Archipelago, the Philippines and some Indo-West Pacific Islands including Fiji and Samoa (Schütt & Glaubrecht, 1999).
Beesley, P. L., Ross, G. J. B. & Wells, A., Eds. (1998). Mollusca: The Southern Synthesis. Parts A & B. Melbourne, CSIRO Publishing.
Brandt, R. A. M. (1974). The non-marine aquatic Mollusca of Thailand. Archiv Für Molluskenkunde 105: 1-423.
Glaubrecht, M., Brinkmann, N. & Pöppe, J. (2009). Diversity and disparity ‘down under’: systematics, biogeography and reproductive modes of the ‘marsupial’ freshwater Thiaridae (Caenogastropoda, Cerithioidea) in Australia. Zoosystematics and Evolution 85: 199-275.
Iredale, T. (1943). A basic list of the fresh water Mollusca of Australia. Australian Zoologist 10: 188-230.
Maaß, N. & Glaubrecht, M. (2012). Comparing the reproductive biology of three “marsupial”, eu-viviparous gastropods (Cerithioidea, Thiaridae) from drainages of Australia’s monsoonal north. Zoosystematics and Evolution 88: 293–315.
Schütt, S., & Glaubrecht, M. (1999). Thiara amarula (Linné, 1758) (Caenogastropoda: Thiaridae) in Australia–new evidence on the anatomy of the reproductive system in a viviparous freshwater mollusc.Courier Forschungsinstitut Senckenberg 215: 181-188.
Smith, B. J. (1992). Non-marine Mollusca. Pp. i-xii, 1-408 in W. W. K. Houston. Zoological Catalogue of Australia, 8. Canberra, Australian Government Publishing Service.
