Hi,
i have no answers to your questions, but im an archaeologist that works
very offen with shells (my speciality, actually) and I have only the
shell to identify the species. So I undersatnd you completely in the
problem of how to identify a specimen only by its shell.
I will be reading anxiously all your answers.

marcela lucero

Olivier Caro wrote:

> Hello
>
> Acmaea pustulata (Helbling, 1779) is sometimes placed in the genus
> Colisella, which is often included as a subgenus of Lottia, family
> Lottiidae.
> This shells is also placed in the genus Patelloida. Many other
> Acmaeidae are continuously travelling from a family to an other,
> changing of genus/subgenus, and never let the beginner the opportunity
> to get a clear idea of what is an Acmaea, a Lottia, a Colisella
> etc..., what are the valid generic names, what are their families etc.
> Acmaea virginea is Tectura virginea, Nipponacmaea belongs to
> Lottiidae, Lottidae is not a true family and must be regarded as
> included in Patellidae, and many Lottiidae species may return to
> Acmaeidae, etc. etc. STOP! Is there somewhere on this planet a person
> who decided to attack this problem and found interesting results?
> What are the up-to-date opinions regarding this or these families?
> What is an Acmaea, a Lottia, a Patella? And, why not, what
> about Nacellidae also?
>
> I suppose the existence of evident anatomical differences, but the
> "shell collector", who is not a scientist, but a photograph, an
> architect, a senator, or a swimming pools dealer, cannot have the
> first idea of these anatomical differences (in soft parts), as all
> what this person has is a conical shell looking like a flat hat, a
> pronounced tendancy to look at his/her feet when walking along the
> shore, and... books, which always quickly fly over this systematic bog
> to land in a better known place, like Trochacea.
>
> And what is Acmaea paleacea, an Acmeaea? a minute Patella compressa? a
> trumpet?
> Is Patelloida striata a tectura, an Acmaea, a Colisella? and so and so
> and so ad nauseam.
>
> Any help will be considered as the Holy Water-Bottle, the Manna slowly
> raining on Sinai
>
> Olivier Caro

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