Nuculidae

Nucula hartvigiana, from here.

Belongs within: Opponobranchia.

The Nuculidae are a family of small infaunal bivalves that first appeared in the Ordovician. They possess nacreous shells with an opisthogyrate beak, resilifer and internal ligament. Members of the type genus Nucula typically possess a polished periostracum. The genus Acila is characterised by divaricate sculpture. The Australasian Pronucula has an arched hinge with separated elements and a vertical resilifer.

Nuculidae [Ctenidiobranchia, Nuculoidea]
    |--Nuculoma tenuis H00, HG98
    |--Rumptunucula Bergmans 1978 M12
    |--Freja JB12
    |--Nuculavus JB12
    |--Palaeonucula Quenstedt 1930 H00
    |    |--*P. hammeri (Defrance 1825) [=Nucula hammeri] H00
    |    `--P. navis (Piette 1856) (see below for synonymy) H00
    |--Austronucula Powell 1939 P61
    |    |--*A. schencki Powell 1939 P61
    |    `--A. galatheae Dell 1956 P61
    |--Nuculoidea SB93
    |    |--N. deceptriformis Bailey 1983 SB93
    |    `--N. opima (Hall 1843) SB93
    |--Dacryomya Agassiz 1840 [=Dacryomia Gressley 1838 (n. n.)] H00
    |    |--*D. lacryma (de Sowerby 1824) [=Nucula lacryma] H00
    |    |--D. gaveyi H00
    |    `--D. heberti (Martin 1860) (see below for synonymy) H00
    |--Linucula Marwick 1931 P61
    |    |--*L. ruatakiensis (Marwick 1926) P61, F27a [=Nucula ruatakiensis P61]
    |    |--L. gallinacea (Finlay 1930) P61
    |    `--L. recens Dell 1956 P61
    |--Leionucula Quenstedt 1930 M12
    |    |--L. faba (Xu 1999) [=Nucula (Leionucosla) faba] XZ10
    |    |--L. formosa (Nagao 1930) AJH07
    |    |--L. ovatotruncata GAS03
    |    `--L. strangei PG98
    |--Ennucula Iredale 1931 P61
    |    |--*E. obliqua P61 (see below for synonymy)
    |    |--E. puelcha (d’Orbigny 1842) S11
    |    |--E. strangei (Adams 1856) [=Nucula strangei] P61
    |    `--E. tenuis SW11
    |--Acila M12
    |    |--A. castrensis (Hinds 1843) M12 [=Nucula (Acila) castrensis B56; incl. N. lyallii C64]
    |    |--A. cobboldiae C64
    |    |--A. demessa Finlay 1927 [=Nucula truncata Gabb 1864 nec Brown 1827 nec Nilsson 1827] F27b
    |    |--A. divaricata (Hinds 1843) SZX10 [=Nucula divaricata C64]
    |    |--A. (Truncacila) hokkaidoensis Nagao 1932 AJH07
    |    `--A. mirabilis (Adams & Reeve 1850) XZ10 [=Nucula (Acila) mirabilis C64; incl. N. (A.) insignis Gould 1861 C64]
    |--Pronucula Hedley 1902 P61
    |    |--*P. decorosa P61
    |    |--P. bollonsi Powell 1955 P61
    |    |--P. kermadecensis Oliver 1915 F27a
    |    |--P. maoria Powell 1937 P61
    |    |--P. mesembrina Hedley 1916 P61
    |    `--P. tenuis Powell 1927 P61
    |--Leda Schumacher 1817 C64, G79
    |    |--L. abyssicola U79
    |    |--L. caelata C64
    |    |--L. caudata C64 [=Arca caudata J64]
    |    |--L. corbuloides Smith 1885 H09
    |    |--L. crassa (Hinds 1843) [=Nucula crassa] H09
    |    |--L. cuneata [incl. L. inornata] C64
    |    |--L. darwini Smith 1884 H09
    |    |--L. diversa NU83
    |    |--L. eburnea [incl. L. lyrata] C64
    |    |--L. elenensis C64
    |    |--L. fastidiosa Adams 1856 H86
    |    |--L. fossa Baird 1864 [incl. L. foveata Baird 1863 (n. n.)] C64
    |    |--L. hamata Carpenter 1864 C64
    |    |--L. hindsii Hanl. 1860 C64
    |    |--L. huttoni Tenison-Woods 1878 F71
    |    |--L. inconspicua F71
    |    |--L. intermedia U79
    |    |--L. jamaicensis G79
    |    |--L. lucida Tenison-Woods 1879 non Yoldia lucida Lovén 1845 (not preoc.if in dif. gen.) F71
    |    |--L. minuta [=Arca minuta] J64
    |    |--L. neariformis Smith 1885 H09
    |    |--L. novaeguineensis Smith 1885 H09
    |    |--L. pella PP64
    |    |--L. pernula (Müller 1779) N79 [=Arca pernula N79; incl. L. macilenta J64]
    |    |--L. pernuloides C64
    |    |--L. polita C64
    |    |--L. praeacuta G31
    |    |--L. pygmaea [=Arca pygmaea; incl. Nucula lenticula] J64
    |    |--L. sowerbiana C64
    |    |--L. speluncaris G31
    |    |--L. steenstrupi C64
    |    |--L. sulculata GW02
    |    |--L. taylori Hanl. 1860 C64
    |    `--L. watsoni Smith 1885 H09
    `--Nucula Gray 1824 M12
         |--*N. nucleus (Linnaeus 1758) P61, M12 [=Arca nucleus P61]
         |--N. annulata Hampson 1971 M12
         |--N. arcaeformis Philippi 1887 F27b
         |--N. beyrichi G31
         |--N. cancellata Meek & Hayden 1856 M12
         |--N. cascoensis Mighels & Adams 1842 J49
         |--N. certisinus Finlay 1928 P61
         |--N. chapmani Cossmann 1920 [=N. arcaeformis Chapman 1908 non Philippi 1887] F27b
         |--N. cobboldiae C64
         |--N. cooperi Moore 1870 [incl. N. truncata Moore 1870 nec Brown 1827 nec Nilsson 1827 nec Gabb 1864] F27b
         |--N. cumingi (Hinds 1843) [=Leionucula cumingi] M12
         |--N. decipiens PC11
         |--N. decisa Conrad 1855 C64
         |--N. delphinodonta Mighels & Adams 1842 M12
         |--N. dunedinensis Finlay 1928 P61
         |--N. gibbosa T64
         |--N. grangei Marwick 1926 F27a
         |--N. hanleyi Winkworth 1931 M12
         |--N. hartvigiana Pfeiffer 1864 P61
         |--N. loringi Adams & Angas 1863 H09
         |--N. minuta Tenison-Woods 1876 M12
         |--N. mulleri Cossmann 1903 (see below for synonymy) F27b
         |--N. nitida Sowerby 1833 M12
         |--N. nitidula Adams 1856 [incl. N. castanea] P61
         |--N. ovatotruncata L10
         |--N. proxima Say 1822 M12
         |--N. pusilla Angas 1877 (see below for synonymy) M12
         |--N. radiata N79
         |--N. rossiana Finlay 1930 P61
         |--N. rostrata G20
         |--N. sejugata Etheridge 1904 F71
         |--N. simplex Deshayes 1842 F27b
         |--N. strangeiformis Dell 1956 P61
         |--N. sulcata (Bronn 1831) M12
         |--N. superba Hedley 1902 H09
         |--N. tatei Finlay 1924 [=N. semistriata Tate 1886 (preoc.)] F27b
         |--N. tenuis (Montagu 1808) BN03, XZ10 (see below for synonymy)
         |--N. torresi Smith 1885 H09
         |--N. truncata Nilsson 1827 non Brown 1827 F27b
         |--N. tumidula Malm 1860 [incl. N. pumila Asbjörnsen in Sars 1868 (n. n.)] N79
         |--N. turgida Leckenby & Marshall 1875 [incl. N. moorei Winckworth 1931] M12
         `--N. wymmensis G31

Nomina nuda: Nucula diluvialis Mighels 1841 J49
             N. intermedia Mighels 1841 J49

Dacryomya heberti (Martin 1860) [=Leda heberti; incl. L. romani Oppel 1856 (n. n.), L. vendaeensis Cossmann 1904] H00

*Ennucula obliqua P61 [=Nucula obliqua P61; incl. N. antipodum Hanley 1860 F27b, N. dilecta Smith 1891 F27b, N. grayi Tenison-Woods 1877 F27b, N. simplex Adams 1856 non Deshayes 1842 F27b, N. tenisoni Pritchard 1896 F27b, N. tumida Tenison-Woods 1877 (preoc.) F27b]

Nucula mulleri Cossmann 1903 [=N. truncata Muller 1898 nec Brown 1827 nec Nilsson 1827 nec Gabb 1864 nec Moore 1870] F27b

Nucula pusilla Angas 1877 [incl. Pronucula concentrica Cotton 1930, N. hedleyi Pritchard & Gatliff 1904, N. micans Angas 1879] M12

Nucula tenuis (Montagu 1808) BN03, XZ10 [=Arca tenuis J64, N. (Leionucosla) tenuis XZ10, Yoldia tenuis N79; incl. N. lucida C64]

Palaeonucula navis (Piette 1856) [=Nucula navis; incl. N. cordata Goldfuss 1837 non Roemer 1836, N. pinguis Moberg 1888, N. sinemuriensis Martin 1858, N. ungulella Tate 1870] H00

*Type species of generic name indicated

REFERENCES

[AJH07] Amano, K., R. G. Jenkins & Y. Hikida. 2007. A new gigantic Nucinella (Bivalvia: Solemyoida) from the Cretaceous cold-seep deposit in Hokkaido, northern Japan. Veliger 49 (2): 84–90.

[B56] Berry, S. S. 1956. Mollusca dredged by the Orca off the Santa Barbara Islands, California, in 1951. Journal of the Washington Academy of Sciences 46 (5): 150–157.

[BN03] Bourlat, S. J., C. Nielsen, A. E. Lockyer, D. T. J. Littlewood & M. J. Telford. 2003. Xenoturbella is a deuterostome that eats molluscs. Nature 424: 925–928.

[C64] Carpenter, P. P. 1864. Supplementary report on the present state of our knowledge with regard to the Mollusca of the west coast of North America. Report of the British Association for the Advancement of Science 33: 517–686.

[F27a] Finlay, H. J. 1927a. A further commentary on New Zealand molluscan systematics. Transactions and Proceedings of the New Zealand Institute 57: 320–485.

[F27b] Finlay, H. J. 1927b. New specific names for austral Mollusca. Transactions and Proceedings of the New Zealand Institute 57: 488–533.

[F71] Fletcher, H. O. 1971. Catalogue of type specimens of fossils in the Australian Museum, Sydney. Australian Museum Memoir 13: 1–167.

[GW02] Giribet, G., & W. Wheeler. 2002. On bivalve phylogeny: a high-level analysis of the Bivalvia (Mollusca) based on combined morphology and DNA sequence data. Invertebrate Biology 121 (4): 271–324.

[G20] Goldfuss, G. A. 1820. Handbuch der Naturgeschichte vol. 3. Handbuch der Zoologie pt 1. Johann Leonhard Schrag: Nürnberg.

[G31] Grabau, A. W. 1931. The Permian of Mongolia: A report on the Permian fauna of the Jisu Honguer limestone of Mongolia and its relations to the Permian of other parts of the world. American Museum of Natural History: New York.

[GAS03] Gulbin, V. V., I. S. Arzamastsev & V. M. Shulkin. 2003. Ecological monitoring of the water area of Port Vostochnyi (Wrangel Bay) in the Sea of Japan (1995–2002). Russian Journal of Marine Biology 29 (5): 284–295.

[G79] Guppy, R. J. L. 1879. First sketch of a marine invertebrate fauna of the Gulf of Paria and its neighbourhood. Part I.—Mollusca. Journal of Conchology 2: 151–172.

[H09] Hedley, C. 1909. The Marine Fauna of Queensland: Address by the President of Section D. Australasian Association for the Advancement of Science: Brisbane.

[H00] Hodges, P. 2000. The Early Jurassic Bivalvia from the Hettangian and Lower Sinemurian of south-west Britain. Part. 1. Monograph of the Paleontographical Society 614: 1–64.

[HG98] Holte, B., & B. Gulliksen. 1998. Common macrofaunal dominant species in the sediments of some north Norwegian and Svalbard glacial fjords. Polar Biology 19: 375–382.

[H86] Hutton, F. W. 1886. The Mollusca of the Pareora and Oamaru systems of New Zealand. Proceedings of the Linnean Society of New South Wales, series 2, 1 (1): 205–237.

[J64] Jeffreys, J. G. 1864. The Upper Tertiary fossils at Uddevalla, in Sweden. Report of the British Association for the Advancement of Science 33 (Notices and Abstracts): 73–79.

[JB12] Johnson, M. E., & B. G. Baarli. 2012. Development of intertidal biotas through Phanerozoic time. In: Talent, J. A. (ed.) Earth and Life: Global biodiversity, extinction intervals and biogeographic perturbations through time pp. 63–128. Springer.

[J49] Johnson, R. I. 1949. Jesse Wedgwood Mighels with a bibliography and a catalogue of his species. Occasional Papers on Mollusks 1 (14): 213–231.

[L10] Lebedev, E. B. 2010. Diversity of soft-bottom mollusks in the Far Eastern Marine Reserve (Peter the Great Bay, Sea of Japan). In: China-Russia Bilateral Symposium: Proceedings of the China-Russia Bilateral Symposium of "Comparison on Marine Biodiversity in the Northwest Pacific Ocean", 10–11 October 2010, Qingdao (China) pp. 169–173. Institute of Oceanology, Chinese Academy of Sciences; A. V. Zhirmunsky Institute of Marine Biology, Far East Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences.

[M12] Morton, B. 2012. The biology and functional morphology of Nucula pusilla (Bivalvia: Protobranchia: Nuculidae) from Western Australia, Australia: primitive or miniature simplicity? Records of the Western Australian Museum 27 (2): 85–100.

[N79] Norman, A. M. 1879. The Mollusca of the fiords near Bergen, Norway. Journal of Conchology 2: 8–77.

[NU83] Norris, A. W., & T. T. Uyeno. 1983. Biostratigraphy and paleontology of middle-upper Devonian boundary beds, Gypsum Cliffs area, northeastern Alberta. Geological Survey of Canada Bulletin 313: 1–65.

[PP64] Peres, J. M., & J. Picard. 1964. Nouveau manuel de bionomie benthique de la mer Mediterranee. Recueil des Travaux de la Station Marine d'Endoume, Bulletin 31 (27): 5–137.

[PC11] Plazzi, F., A. Ceregato, M. Taviani & M. Passamonti. 2011. A molecular phylogeny of bivalve mollusks: ancient radiations and divergences as revealed by mitochondrial genes. PLoS One 6 (11): e27147.

[P61] Powell, A. W. B. 1961. Shells of New Zealand: An illustrated handbook 4^th ed. Whitcombe and Tombs Limited: Christchurch.

[PG98] Probert, P. K., & S. L. Grove. 1998. Macrobenthic assemblages of the continental shelf and upper slope off the west coast of South Island, New Zealand. Journal of the Royal Society of New Zealand 28: 259–280.

[SZX10] Sha, Z., J. Zhang & F. Xu. 2010. Acila divaricata (Hinds, 1843) and A. mirabilis (Adams et Reeve, 1850) are one? Evidence from COI and 16S mitochondrial DNA. In: China-Russia Bilateral Symposium: Proceedings of the China-Russia Bilateral Symposium of "Comparison on Marine Biodiversity in the Northwest Pacific Ocean", 10–11 October 2010, Qingdao (China) pp. 125. Institute of Oceanology, Chinese Academy of Sciences; A. V. Zhirmunsky Institute of Marine Biology, Far East Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences.

[S11] Simone, L. R. L. 2011. Phylogeny of the Caenogastropoda (Mollusca), based on comparative morphology. Arquivos de Zoologia 42 (4): 161–323.

[SB93] Skelton, P. W., & M. J. Benton. 1993. Mollusca: Rostroconchia, Scaphopoda and Bivalvia. In: Benton, M. J. (ed.) The Fossil Record 2 pp. 237–263. Chapman & Hall: London.

[SW11] Smith, S. A., N. G. Wilson, F. E. Goetz, C. Feehery, S. C. S. Andrade, G. W. Rouse, G. Giribet & C. W. Dunn. 2011. Resolving the evolutionary relationships of molluscs with phylogenomic tools. Nature 480: 364–367.

[T64] Tate, G. 1864. Description of a sea-star, Cribellites carbonarius, from the Mountain Limestone formation of Northumberland, with a notice of its association with Carboniferous plants. Report of the British Association for the Advancement of Science 33 (Notices and Abstracts): 88–89.

[U79] d'Urban, W. S. M. 1879. The Mollusca of Barents Sea, between Spitzbergen and Novaya Zemblia. Journal of Conchology 2: 88–94.

[XZ10] Xu, F., & J. Zhang. 2010. Study on the bivalve faunal composition of the Yellow Sea and Bohai Sea. In: China-Russia Bilateral Symposium: Proceedings of the China-Russia Bilateral Symposium of "Comparison on Marine Biodiversity in the Northwest Pacific Ocean", 10–11 October 2010, Qingdao (China) pp. 7–12. Institute of Oceanology, Chinese Academy of Sciences; A. V. Zhirmunsky Institute of Marine Biology, Far East Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences.

Last updated: 24 December 2021.