[Animals] They capture a species of living fossil clam in the seas of California for the first time

[BirSaNN]

The species to which the living fossil clam belongs disappeared 400 million years ago from Earth. Today, copies survive in the US.
It happened in the Santa Barbara sea, southern California. Among the salty waters, a team of scientists identified a small white mollusk . As they approached it, they realized that the animal shared characteristics with an ancient species, which inhabited the Earth at least 400 million years ago. Before their eyes, they had a living fossil clam specimen .

"Discovering a new species is always exciting," the UC Santa Barbara researchers write in a statement , "but so is finding a live one that everyone assumed had been lost to time ." They found it just off the coast of Naples Point, which surprised scientists even more: this region had been extensively studied, and they had never found signs of prehistoric life before.

 

LINK: https://www.ngenespanol.com/animales/encuentran-una-almeja-fosil-viva-en-california/