Southwest Florida Shells

by José H. Leal

Family Mytilidae

Lioberus castanea

(Say, 1822)

Chestnut Mussel

Shell size to 28 mm; shell small for family, elongate-ovate, inflated, thin-walled, with taller section on posterior one third. Hinge with slight expansion under umbo. Color brown, with very sharp, slanted line separating lighter color posterior end from darker anterior end. Nacreous bluish inside. Ocasionally common on the east end of Sanibel Island. Shell in supplementary image collected in 202 by Ken and Alice Piech on Sanibel.