Linda,

Abbott's color plates are poor and little help for Chione intapurpurea.
However, the drawing in his field guide is helpful, if you have it.  It can
hardly be confused with  Mercenaria mercenaria or Chione cancellata once you
have a confirmed sample.  Unfortunately I do not have any of my own photos.

By the way, what you're calling Chione cancellata is almost definitely
Chione elevata (Say, 1822) if collected from our Gulf or Atlantic coasts.
See "One Species Becomes Two: The Case of Chione cancellata, The Resurrected
C. Elevata, and a Phylogenetic Analysis of Chione," J. Moll. Stud. (2000),
66, 517-534, The Malacological Society of London 2000, Peter D. Roopnarine
and Geerat J. Vermeij.  If you have Redfern's book, you'll note that he's
adopted C. elevata.

Marlo
Merritt Island, FL

-----Original Message-----
From: Conchologists of America List [mailto:[log in to unmask]]On
Behalf Of Linda Bush
Sent: Friday, October 11, 2002 6:07 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Chione intapurpurea Conrad, 1849


Hi, Bivalve Collectors!

Can anyone give me a description of this shell, or possible scan one and
send it to me in jpg?    I think I have several examples of this shell, but
they don't  match Abbott's` description in "AmerIcan Seashells," (yes, I
know the book has a lot of flaws).   I do have a scanner now but do not have
it set up yet.   What I am looking at has some outer markings of
fine brown lines, and sometimes a bluish-purple tinge.   They remind me of a
Mercenaria mercenaria with more prominent ridges (that's what I thought I
might be dealing with at first; but I have some that are too big to any
longer be called "young."
There are NO RADIAL MARKINKS, unlike Chione cancellata.Some of them have
some purple inside.   I have similar shells from the Gulf coast of Florida
and the Gulf coast of Texas.

Does anyone else feel as if the Venerid clams will  "drive them round the
bend?"

Thanks,
Linda - still cataloguing.

I may have even another species mixed in with these, almost the same, but
the ridges are much farther apart.   These tend to
run smaller than the ones I described above - or else, I have just not found
any bigger ones yet.