Bivalve
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Bivalves Fossil range: Cambrian - Recent |
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"Acephala" from Ernst Haeckel's Kunstformen der Natur, 1904
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Scientific classification | ||||||
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Anomalosdesmata |
Bivalves is a huge class of mollusks. They usually have a shell that is composed of two parts. Both parts are more or less symmetrical. There are over 30.000 species of bivalves. All of them live in the water, some of them in the seas, others in fresh water. All are filter feeders. Like the other shelled mollusks, the gastropods, bivalves produce a limy shell out of calcium.
The best known examples of bivalves are clams, mussels, scallops and oysters.