Olive Turban Shell, Uvanilla olivacea

Olive Turban Shell, Uvanilla olivacea. Size: 2.7 cm (1.1 inches) x 1.4 cm (0.6 inches). Shell collected off the beach in the greater Los Cabos area, Baja California Sur, April 2017.

Olive Turban Shell, Uvanilla olivacea. Size: 2.6 cm (1.0 inches) x 1.3 cm (0.5 inches). Shell collected off the beach at Las Barilles, Baja California Sur, February 2023. Size: 5.6 cm (3.8 inches) x 3.2 cm (1.3 inches) in height. Collection courtesy of Mack and Becky Fonteno, Las Barilles, Baja California Sur.  Photographs and identifications courtesy of Colin Campbell, DVM, Punta Chivato, Baja California Sur.

The Olive Turban, Uvanilla olivacea (W. Wood, 1828), Is a gastropod mollusk that is a member of the Turbinidae Family of Turbans. They are also known as the Blood Spotted Star Shell. The shell is cone shaped, rugged and strong and almost as tall as it is wide. It consists of six or seven whorls, with the bottom whorl being more rounded and the external sculpture consisting of fine diagonal lines. The shell is olive or brownish green in color and most shells have a fibrous periostracum, the center of the base is marked with a brilliant reddish orange spot in the umbilical pit with a dark brown or black border and the aperture is pearly white. Olive Turban Shells reach a maximum of 6.5 cm (2.6 inches) in diameter.

Olive Turbans are found clinging to rocks in the intertidal zone to depths up to 20 m (65 feet). They are found in the Sea of Cortez from La Paz to the greater Cabo San Lucas area, Baja California Sur, and range south to El Salvador. The shell collected above and documented photographically extends the range for this mollusk further north into the Sea of Cortez. They have not been documented from the coastal waters of the West Coast of Baja.

A synonym is Astraea olivacea.