Northern Nutclam

• Instead of filtering the water, it forages in the mud with extensible labial palps longer than its own shell.
• Its shell has a rear end drawn out into a beak, from which it takes its common name of pointed nut clam.
• It does not filter water as most bivalves do: it is a detritivore and uses very long, extensible labial palps to search the surrounding mud for organic particles.
• It belongs to the protobranchs, the oldest bivalve lineage, which retains gills used mainly for respiration rather than feeding.
• The rear end of its shell is drawn out into a beak, which is where the name pointed nut clam comes from.
• It is a dominant component of Arctic mud communities and important prey for bottom-feeding fish.

Skeleton type

Invertebrate - external calcareous bivalve shell (mollusc)

Habitat and environment

Soft mud and sand bottoms, between 10 and 1,500 m deep

Sources consulted: Müller (1779) · Zardus (2002), Advances in Marine Biology · WoRMS

The pins mark the parks and dive sites where its presence is documented.