Pod Razor Shell

• The traditional way of gathering them is to pour salt into the hole in the sand: the sudden change in salinity brings the razor clam to the surface.
• It can dig faster than an adult can dig with their hands.
• It is an extraordinary digger: it sinks into the sand faster than a human can dig, alternating expansion of the foot with jets of water that fluidise the sediment around it.
• That mechanism has been studied in engineering to design anchors that bury themselves.
• Traditional shellfishing exploits its sensitivity to salt: put salt down the hole and the razor clam comes to the surface.
• In the Ebro delta its catches have risen 3.6-fold since 2016, while those of clam and cockle fell.

Skeleton type

Invertebrate - external calcareous bivalve shell (mollusc)

Habitat and environment

Clean intertidal and subtidal sands of the north-eastern Atlantic

Sources consulted: Linneo (1758) · Winter et al., estudios de biomimética de RoboClam · datos pesqueros del delta del Ebro · ScienceDirect (Hughes 1989) · Science Advances, How colonial animals evolve · Wikipedia, Zooid