Family Friendly Shelling Tours available on Marco Island The Lettered olive is a species of large predatory sea snails, a marine gastropod mollusk in the family Olividae, the olive shells, olive snails, or olives. The lettered olive typically lives in near-shore waters on shallow sand flats near inlets. The empty shell is occasionally, or sometimes commonly, washed up onto beaches. The shell is 2 1/2 inch long max size this one is on the larger size .The olive is a smooth shiny, cylindrical-shaped shell with with a short spire .The aperture is narrow and extending almost the length of shell, counting around the bottom and ending in a notch on the other side. The suture is V-cut and deep. The lower part of the whorl is just above where the suture extends outward and then at a sharp shoulder drops into the suture .The olives can vary in color from cream to greyish exterior with reddish ~ brown zigzag markings .The common name of this species is derived from darker surface markings that sometimes resemble letters. The olive is a carnivore .. it captures bivalves and small crustaceans with its foot and takes them below the sand surface to digest .Seeing them at a low tide you can sometimes see the trails they leave from crawling. Females lay floating, round egg maneulae that are often found in beach drift young and swimming free. We find the lettered olives daily but rarely the golden olives and alive like this one. 🐚 🐚 Only Collect Empty Shells 🐚 🐚 Photo Credit : Shell Guide Leah 🐚
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