Assiminea is a genus of minute, salt marsh

Salt marsh

A salt marsh is an environment in the upper coastal intertidal zone between land and salt water or brackish water, it is dominated by dense stands of halophytic plants such as herbs, grasses, or low shrubs. These plants are terrestrial in origin and are essential to the stability of the salt marsh...

 snail

Snail

Snail is a common name applied to most of the members of the molluscan class Gastropoda that have coiled shells in the adult stage. When the word is used in its most general sense, it includes sea snails, land snails and freshwater snails. The word snail without any qualifier is however more often...

s with an operculum

Operculum (gastropod)

The operculum, meaning little lid, is a corneous or calcareous anatomical structure which exists in many groups of sea snails and freshwater snails, and also in a few groups of land snails...

, aquatic

Aquatic animal

An aquatic animal is an animal, either vertebrate or invertebrate, which lives in water for most or all of its life. It may breathe air or extract its oxygen from that dissolved in water through specialised organs called gills, or directly through its skin. Natural environments and the animals that...

 gastropod mollusks, or micromollusk

Micromollusk

A micromollusk is a descriptive term for a shelled mollusk which is extremely small, even at full adult size. The word is usually, but not exclusively, applied to marine mollusks, although in addition, numerous species of land snails and freshwater mollusks also reach adult size at very small...

s, in the family Assimineidae

Assimineidae

Assimineidae is a family of minute snails with an operculum that live in saltwater, freshwater or on the land; they are mostly aquatic gastropod mollusks or micromollusks, in the clade Littorinimorpha.- Ecology :...

.

Distribution and habitat

These snails are distributed worldwide. They live usually in brackish water and salt marshes of tropical and temperate regions, at beaches, in water and at land.

Description

These are very small to medium large snails, between 2 and 13 mm). Some adults don't exceed a size of 3 mm. The shape of the thin shells is somewhat ovately conical. The margin of the aperture

Aperture

In optics, an aperture is a hole or an opening through which light travels. More specifically, the aperture of an optical system is the opening that determines the cone angle of a bundle of rays that come to a focus in the image plane. The aperture determines how collimated the admitted rays are,...

 is simple. The operculum

Operculum (gastropod)

The operculum, meaning little lid, is a corneous or calcareous anatomical structure which exists in many groups of sea snails and freshwater snails, and also in a few groups of land snails...

 is in most cases horny. The eyes are at the end of short, stout stalks. They feed on vegetable detritus

Detritus

Detritus is a biological term used to describe dead or waste organic material.Detritus may also refer to:* Detritus , a geological term used to describe the particles of rock produced by weathering...

 and small algae. They lay their eggs in the mud and hatch as free-swimming larvae.

Species

According to the World Register of Marine Species

World Register of Marine Species

The World Register of Marine Species is a database that hopes to provide an authoritative and comprehensive list of names of marine organisms. The content of the registry is edited and maintained by scientific specialists on each group of organism. These taxonomists control the quality of the...

, the following species with valid names are included within the genus Assiminea :

• Assiminea avilai
  Assiminea avilai
  Assiminea avilai is a species of minute operculate snail, a marine gastropod mollusk or micromollusk in the family Assimineidae....
  
  van Aartsen, 2008
• Assiminea geayi
  Assiminea geayi
  Assiminea geayi is a species of minute operculate snail, a marine gastropod mollusk or micromollusk in the family Assimineidae....
  
  Lamy, 1910
• Assiminea gittenbergeri
  Assiminea gittenbergeri
  Assiminea gittenbergeri is a species of minute operculate snail, a marine gastropod mollusk or micromollusk in the family Assimineidae....
  
  van Aartsen, 2008
• Assiminea glaubrechti
  Assiminea glaubrechti
  Assiminea glaubrechti is a species of minute operculate snail, a marine gastropod mollusk or micromollusk in the family Assimineidae....
  
  van Aartsen, 2008
• Assiminea globulus
  Assiminea globulus
  Assiminea globulus is a species of minute operculate snail, a marine gastropod mollusk or micromollusk in the family Assimineidae....
  
  
• Assiminea grayana
  Assiminea grayana
  Assiminea grayana, common name the "dun sentinel", is a species of very small salt marsh snail, a terrestrial Assiminea grayana, common name the "dun sentinel", is a species of very small salt marsh snail, a terrestrial Assiminea grayana, common name the "dun sentinel", is a species of very small...
  
  Fleming, 1828
• Assiminea infirma Berry, 1947 (badwater snail
  Badwater snail
  The Badwater snail, scientific name Assiminea infirma, is a species of minute, salt marsh snail; of the Badwater Basin in Death Valley, California, United States....
  
  )
• Assiminea ovata
  Assiminea ovata
  Assiminea ovata is a species of minute operculate snail, a marine gastropod mollusk or micromollusk in the family Assimineidae....
  
  
• Assiminea palauensis
  Assiminea palauensis
  Assiminea palauensis is a species of minute, salt marsh snail with an operculum, an aquatic gastropod mollusk, or micromollusks, in the family Assimineidae. This species is endemic to Palau.-References:...
  
  Thiele, 1927
• Assiminea pecos
  Assiminea pecos
  Assiminea pecos is a rare species of snail in the family Assimineidae known by the common name Pecos assiminea. It is native to New Mexico and Texas in the United States. Specimens known from Mexico are now treated as members of a separate species, Assiminea cienegensis...
  
  Taylor
  Edward Harrison Taylor
  Edward Harrison Taylor was an American herpetologist from Kansas.He was born in Maysville, Missouri and studied at the University of Kansas in Lawrence, Kansas, graduating with a B.A. in 1912. Subsequently, he went to the Philippines, where at first he held a teacher's post in a village in central...
  
  , 1987 (pecos assiminea)
• Assiminea rolani
  Assiminea rolani
  Assiminea rolani is a species of minute operculate snail, a marine gastropod mollusk or micromollusk in the family Assimineidae....
  
  van Aartsen, 2008
• Assiminea succinea
  Assiminea succinea
  Assiminea succinea is a species of minute operculate snail, a marine gastropod mollusk or micromollusk in the family Assimineidae....
  
  (Pfeiffer, 1840) : Atlantic assiminea

The Indo-Pacific Molluscan Database also includes the following species with names in current use :

• Assiminea brevicula (Pfeiffer, 1854)
• Assiminea estuarina Habe, 1946
• Assiminea hiradoensis Habe, 1942
• Assiminea interrupta Dautzenberg & Fischer, 1905
• Assiminea japonica Martens, 1877
• Assiminea nitida (Pease, 1865) : this species belongs to the genus Paludinella
  Paludinella
  Paludinella is a genus of minute salt marsh snails with an operculum, aquatic gastropod mollusks or micromollusks, in the family Assimineidae.-Species:The genus Paludinella contains the following species:* Paludinella conica...
  
  as has been demonstrated by Thiele (1927, p. 128), because of a different dentition and an open umbilicus
• Assiminea parasitologica Kuroda, 1958
• Assiminea septentrionalis Habe, 1942
• Assiminea vulgaris
  Assiminea vulgaris
  Assiminea vulgaris is a species of minute salt marsh snail with an operculum, an aquatic gastropod mollusk in the family Assimineidae.-Description:...
  
  (Webster, 1905)

Subgenus Metassiminea Thiele, 1927

• Assiminea buccinoides (Quoy and Gaimard, 1834)
• Assiminea relata Cotton, 1942

The database ITIS

Itis

Itis may refer to* Integrated Taxonomic Information System, a partnership designed to provide consistent and reliable information on the taxonomy of biological species...

 also mentions the following species :

• Assiminea auberiana Orbigny, 1842
• Assiminea californica, (Tryon, 1865) : California assiminea
• Assiminea translucens (Carpenter, 1864)