The giant horned helmet conch, cassis cornuta, has the taxonomic classification by Linneaus in 1758 as follows: Class gastropoda; Order caenogastropoda; SuperFamily tonnacea: Family cassidae. The helmet conches, sometimes called cassid shells, have been extensively researched and documented by the famous "Mr Seashell" U.S. Navy Lieutenant, Dr R. Tucker Abbott.

Dr Abott, not only published "The helmet shells of the world (cassidae)", but also "Introducing Seashells", "The Family Vasidae in the Indo-Pacific", "How To Know the American Marine Shells", "Compendium of Seashells", "American Seashells", "Kingdom of the Seashell" and numerous others. Dr Abbott also bridged the gap between amateur chonchologists and professional malacologists, joining the forces of the amateur shell lovers with the dedicated scientists. Although he started his first museum of conchology, mineralogy and entomology in his parents basement, he later went on to collect specimens for four major U.S. museums, and served ten years at the Smithsonian (1944-1954) as Assistant Curator and Associate Curator of the Department of Mollusks. Dr. Abbott was also the first medical malacologist in history, in that capacity he discovered the life cycle of the schistosome. This discovery saved numerous lives from schistosomiasis, a fatal blood fluke disease.

Dr. Abbott estimated there are about 60 living species of helmet conches. Helmets live in both tropical and temperate seas. They are sand burrowers, found on both intertidal sand flats, and at depths greater than 100 fathoms (600 feet). Helmet conches are echinoid carnivores. They eat poisonous sea urchins (diadema) biscuit urchins, and sand dollars. The females lay egg capsules by the hundreds to thousands, with each capsule holding hundreds of eggs. In some species each egg develops, in others most eggs serve as a food source to the few that develop. Male helmet conches are often much smaller than females (no wonder with laying that many eggs!)

Many of the previously recognized "species" of helmet shells are actually extreme variations of shell characteristics, and perhaps hybrids between distinct species. The largest helmet conch is cassis cornuta. It is not only the largest helmet, but one of the largest living gastropods. The males of cassis cornuta are smaller than the females, and they have fewer dorsal knobs, but the knobs are larger.
	The male helmet conch on the right has large knobs (but less of them) on a smaller body. The female helmet conch on the left has a larger body and more smaller knobs.
Another well known helmet conch is the cameo conch, cypraecassis rufa (Linnaeus, 1758)
These are the red/brown/orange conch shells cameos are cut from.
	The queen helmet conch can also be enormous. The queen has much smaller and more numerous spines than the horned helmet. Here we see left to right, a female horned helmet, a male horned helmet and a queen helmet conch.

This particular huge horned helmet conch sang to bid Jerry G. a safe journey during his transition. Although this shell is not available, I have another horned helmet conch close in size that I would like to see go to the right Museum or Musician. Click here if you have further questions.

The links below the photo will return you to the conch museum.