- José H. Leal
The Coffee Bean Trivia
The Coffee Bean Trivia, Niveria pediculus (Linnaeus, 1758), is another marine gastropod that can be found occasionally on the island beaches of Southwest Florida. Members of the trivia family, the Triviidae, closely resemble the beloved Cowries (family Cypraeidae), but differ in features of their anatomy and usually by having smaller shells with “wrinkled” sculpture (Cowries are usually very smooth and glossy.) Measuring at most about a half inch in length, Trivias generally feed on colonial ascidians (Sea Squirts), and have larvae that spend some time drifting in the water (planktonic larvae) before settling to spend their adult life on the sea floor.
This Coffee Bean Trivia, Niveria pediculus, was collected on Sanibel in 1980.