Veneroida
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| Veneroida | ||||||||||
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 Empty cockle shell, family Cardiidae
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The Veneroida or veneroids are an order of bivalve molluscs. They include some familiar forms such as clams, cockles and zebra mussels. They are generally thick-valved, equal valved, and isomyarian (that is, their adductor muscles are of equal size). The name means "perfected teeth", referring to the three teeth characteristic of the subclass Heterodonta to which this order belongs. Many species are active rather than sessile. However they tend to be filter feeders, feeding through paired Siphons, with a characteristic folded gill structure adapted to that way of life.
Recent work in molecular systematics has suggested that this order is not monophyletic. If this conclusion is sustained, the order will presumably be broken up in due course.
[edit] Classification
- Superfamily Veneroidea
- Superfamily Astartoidea
- Superfamily Corbiculoidea
- Superfamily Tellinoidea
- Superfamily Arcticoidea
- Superfamily Cardioidea
- Superfamily Dreissenoidea
- Superfamily Galeommatoidea
- Superfamily Glossoidea
- Superfamily Lucinoidea
- Superfamily Mactroidea
- Superfamily Solenoidea
- Superfamily Carditoidea
- Superfamily Gastrochaenoidea
- Superfamily Cyamioidea
- Superfamily Chamoidea
- Superfamily Crassatelloidea
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[edit] References
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