Molluscs are great! I mainly spend my time looking at marine molluscs.
There is a group of of sea slugs called the Sacoglossan slugs (https://www.inaturalist.org/taxa/47801-Sacoglossa) that are the only known animals to use kleptoplasty. Basically, they can incorporate the choroplasts stolen from the algae that they eat into their own bodies. These chloroplasts continue to photosynthesise and provide energy for the slug!
Nudibranchs, mentioned above by someone else, literally translates from Latin as ānaked lungā. The sticky up bit you can see at the back of a nudibranch is its gills waving about in the ocean!
Other sea slugs, like the Blue Dragons https://www.inaturalist.org/taxa/48754-Pteraeolidia, feed on hydroids. These hydroids belong to Cnidaria which also includes coral, anemones and jellyfish. They all have nematocysts (stinging cells) and when the slug feeds on hydroids it can take the nematcysts and reuse them in its own body as a stinging defence mechanism!
There is nothing interesting about mollusks! And now Iām leaving, to seek shelter. Seriously, in the Prairies they are few and far between, so I donāt know about them at all. Just thought Iād stir the pot a little.
A Navy diver reported that a squid spent minutes staring into his face mask. The diverās buddy discovered that the squid kept the diverās attention while 3 squids spent time tugging and probably figuring out how to chew at the hoses behind the unsuspecting diverās back.
Yes, there are some of those around. Generally big, muddy and slow. And truth be told, Iām more interested in the Insects! I donāt know why, but mollusks have never drawn me - aquatic Arthropods would be interesting. I actually do find most invertebrate Phyla interesting, but one has to pick and choose! Plus, Iāve never lived near an ocean, which is where it seems all the action is.
Itās kind of not cool to say the group is not interesting in a topic where people who study it gathered to answer OP. Mollusks are very diverce and all are interesting, both terrestial and aquatic, as any other group of living things. Thereāre many steppe species, so you find a lot of them almost everywhere, no need to have an ocean, though checking water is an easy way to find some.
āThe original Phoenician colours lasted forever. The older Tyrian Purple gets, the more robust the colour becomes and, if exposed to sun, the colour only deepens,ā he says, explaining that a 2,500-year-old horse-trapping found in Iran, ālooked as fresh as if it were dyed yesterdayā.*
And, you could make it at home:
āA year ago, he started making dye kits, small wooden boxes containing dye powder, fabric samples, Murex shells and dye-producing glands, with āCarthaginian Purple" printed across the lid in ancient Phoenician script. These souvenir boxes, which tell the story of purple dye in one kit, he says, have broader cultural appeal than just to dyers, helping promote Carthaginian and Phoenician culture and history, as well as natural dying methods, around the world. ā
I used to know the name of the shell the money was made from
There were a few different species used, but the Purple Dwarf Olive Sea Snails (Olivella biplicata) and Pismo clam (Tivela stultorum) were both commonly used.
I spent the end of high school and the summer between high school and undergrad working with the USGS CRM (Cultural Resources Management) team in Santa Barbara studying and excavating Chumash sites. In our area Pismo Clam beads were the most common, but both in that region and elsewhere in California a variety of species were used, including Red Abalone (Haliotis rufescens), California Mussel (Mytilus californianus), and Olivella dama.
Interestingly, the use of shell beads a currency in California is much older than people used to think, reaching as far back as 2000 years.
The beads (and other items) were traded widely, with trade networks reaching as far as the inland Southwest. Indeed, one of the finds we had when I was doing this work in 1990 or 1991 (I forget the exact year now) was the find, in the Cuyama Valley, of a projectile point made from materials found in the interior Southwest and in the style of Southwestern native groups.
In the prairies, there is a Pleistocene relict species, the Iowa Pleistocene snail. And if you follow the link, you will see that there are as yet zero observations on iNaturalist! This is a federally listed endangered species, found only in the Driftless Area, which was an ice-free refugium during the last ice age.
