The Flamingo Tongue Snail, Cyphoma gibbosum, has a unique orange spotted
pattern to what appears to be the outside of its shell. But don’t be fooled! The appealing bright coloration seen is part
of the snail’s body. Flamingo Tongue
Snails wrap their mantel around the actual shell. Surprisingly the shell itself is just plain
white. This might seem kind of strange,
but there is a good reason behind this adaptation. The orange spotted pattern is a warning sign
for predators, because the body of the snail is toxic. By wrapping the mantel of the snail around
the shell, it allows potential predators to get a small taste of the toxins if the snail can not retract the mantel in enough
time. This turns the predators away and
leaves little to no damage done to the shell. The exposed mantle not only acts as a warning, but
is also a tool used for respiration. In
fact the mantel functions as gills to bring oxygen in and to let carbon dioxide
out.
However, the Flamingo Tongue snail is not born toxic. These animals are found in the Caribbean
and southern Atlantic on coral reefs. They feed on gorgonian octocorals. The gorgonian octocorals contain high amounts
allelochemicals, which are toxic to many other animals. This snail also lays its eggs in the
gorgonian corals. They use the toxicity
of the corals to protect the eggs from predators. The hogfish, pufferfish, and Caribbean
spiny lobster are some of the few natural predators of this snail. Studies have shown that humans have recently
been the greatest predator to this snail.
Divers have been over collecting this animal for its smooth white shell
and some even collect the snails because they mistake the orange coloration as
the shell.
