Achatina

Achatina is a genus of medium-sized to very large, air-breathing, tropical land snails, terrestrial pulmonate gastropod mollusks in the family Achatinidae.

Achatina

Charles J. Sharp · CC BY-SA 4.0 · via Wikipedia/Commons. May be a photograph of a specimen, or an artist’s reconstruction — an interpretation of a skeleton, since colour and soft tissue are almost never preserved.

On record

Recorded, not inferred
Sits inside
AchatinidaePBDB
Life habit
epifaunalPBDB, for Gastropoda
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Gastropoda
Vision
limitedPBDB, for Gastropoda

Time the record covers

At least 41 million years on record.

The record covers at least 41.03 Mya to 11.7 ka. No occurrence read is dated outside 48.07 Mya to 0 Mya.

Eocene — about 4 of 18 occurrencesEoceneOligocene — about 0 of 18 occurrencesMiocene — about 2 of 18 occurrencesMiocenePliocene — about 2 of 18 occurrencesPleistocene — about 5 of 18 occurrences49–47 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences47–46 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences46–44 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences44–42 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences42–41 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences41–39 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences39–38 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences38–36 Mya — about 0.9 occurrences36–34 Mya — about 0.9 occurrences34–33 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences25–23 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences23–21 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences21–20 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences20–18 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences18–16 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences16–15 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences6.5–4.9 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences4.9–3.3 Mya — about 1 occurrence3.3–1.6 Mya — about 2 occurrences1.6–0 Mya — about 9 occurrences41.03 Mya11.7 ka49 Mya0 Mya

18 occurrences of Achatina on record. The Paleobiology Database records this as a living group. Bar height is expected occurrences, not a count: each fossil is spread across the span it is dated to, so a tall narrow bar means tight dating and a low wide one means loose.

When

18 occurrences

These are dates about fossils, not the animal: the record can only begin after it arose and end before it died out, so either end may reach further. Shares are expected occurrences: a fossil dated to a span is counted partly in each period it straddles. More on what this infers.

Found in

7 formations

Swartkrans — 26.02°S, 27.72°EKromdraai — 26.00°S, 27.75°EVogel River Series — 3.13°S, 35.13°ECreechbarrow Limestone — 50.65°N, 2.12°WOsborne Beds — 50.71°N, 1.10°WZalumah — 17.42°N, 54.00°EChiwondo — 10.05°S, 33.96°E

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The named rock units Achatina has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 10 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Found in the same rock

543 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 18 sites for Achatina, and this reads all of them. The number is how many of those sites it was catalogued from too. The 24 sharing the most are listed.

This is not a list of everything alive at the time. It is only what has come out of the same ground as this animal and been written down.

Entered from

17 references

Each of the 18 occurrences read was entered from one of these publications, ordered by how many each accounts for. This is not a search for papers mentioning the name. 5 further references are not listed. Entries link to doi.org where the Paleobiology Database holds an identifier, and to its own record where it does not. Relayed as the Paleobiology Database holds them, not checked against what they resolve to.

Media and terms

Media content2

Picture of Achatina

Credit
Charles J. Sharp
Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

CT scan

Licence
In Copyright
Commercial use
cannot be read from the licence given — check the record
Specimen
Microhyla achatina · MCZ:Herp:A-2683

The description on this site

Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0

This is what the site found, which is not the same as what exists.

Keep going

What may have been alongside itAchatinidae through timeThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. (Lamarck 1799)