Snail Graveyard

[Delphinus]

I have had what was sold to me as a "fighting conch" and one as a "strawberry conch." Both have eaten nothing but the diatomaceous covering you get on the sand. Unlike worms who will move in to clean a dead or dying animal, these two will not touch anything but dirt.

My fighting conch has never left the sand. Never on the rocks, never on the glass. The strawberry will make occasonal attempts to climb the glass but never goes higher than 1". Not really a climber. Queen conches, very similar to fighting conches, except that they grow to the size of a football, can and will climb glass and rocks. Anyhow, point being, if you see a "fighting conch" on the rocks or the glass, then it is not really a fighting conch - it's something else.

There are carnivorous and predatory conches and whelks, and probably a host of other kinds of snailish kind of things who will capture and devour other snails. There are so many different species and to the untrained eye, really, they're indistinguishable. You have to rely on the word of the vendor (who has to rely on the word of their distributors, collectors/divers, etc. etc.). And I'm sure there are at least a dozen species that are sold under the monniker "fighting conch" that .. well, aren't. So you have to watch these guys fairly closely and make your own judgment call.