---
title: Thrush Cowrie (Naria turdus)
scientific_name: Naria turdus
common_name: Thrush Cowrie
taxon: Cowries
published: 2026-08-29T19:05:36.406Z
updated: 2026-08-29T20:32:48.471Z
tags: Thrush Cowrie, Naria turdus, Cowries, Red Sea, Marine Life, Diving
url: https://redseacreatures.com/taxon/invertebrate/molluscs/cowries/thrush-cowrie
---

# Thrush Cowrie (*Naria turdus*)

## Quick facts

- **Group:** Cowries (*Cypraeidae*)
- **Size:** up to 6.2 cm
- **Diet:** Herbivore
- **Activity:** Nocturnal
- **Rarity:** Common
- **Habitat:** Intertidal rock and rubble, under stones between the tides
- **Reproduction:** Egg layer, Gonochoric

## How to recognise it

- white to pale shell dusted all over with small brown dots
- found between the tides, not on the reef proper
- up to six centimeters, large for a shore cowrie
- under loose stones on rock flats at low water

This is the cowrie you can find without getting wet.

It lives intertidally, on rock flats and rubble between the tide marks, under loose stones at low water. That single fact separates it from every other species on this page: the rest are reef animals that need a dive or at least a snorkel, and this one is a beachcombing find. Turn stones back the way they were and the animals under them survive; leave them face up and they cook.

The shell is white to pale, dusted all over with small brown dots, which is what the name records: turdus, the thrush, for a speckled breast. Up to six centimeters (2.4 in), which is large for something living in the roughest, most exposed band of the shore.

Like every cowrie it is wrapped in its own mantle in life, two flaps that rise from the foot and fold up over the back until they meet along the middle. The mantle builds the shell from the outside and polishes it as it goes, so an animal alive under a stone is glossy and the empty shells further up the beach are not.

Lamarck described it in 1810. Its range runs from this sea down the East African coast, and it is common at the right state of tide.

## Also known as

- **English:** Thrush cowrie
- **Hebrew:** פי-כושי רב-נקוד
- **Italian:** Ciprea tordo
- **Portuguese:** Búzio-de-Myoko
- **Japanese:** シモフリダカラ
- **Russian:** Ципрея-дрозд

## Scientific synonyms

- *Cypraea (Erosaria) zanzibarica* Sulliotti, 1911
- *Cypraea (Erosaria) zanzibarica var. raripunctata* Sulliotti, 1911
- *Cypraea arenosa* Dillwyn, 1823
- *Cypraea facifer* (Iredale, 1935)
- *Cypraea foedata* Sulliotti, 1911
- *Cypraea nivea* J. E. Gray, 1824
- *Cypraea ovata* Perry, 1811
- *Cypraea pardalina* Dunker, 1852
- *Cypraea phyllidis* H. Shaw, 1915
- *Cypraea pyriformis* G. B. Sowerby II, 1870
- *Cypraea raripunctata* Sulliotti, 1911
- *Cypraea turdus* Lamarck, 1810
- *Cypraea turdus var. alba* G. B. Sowerby I, 1832
- *Cypraea turdus var. distinguenda* F. A. Schilder, 1927
- *Cypraea turdus var. pyriformis* G. B. Sowerby II, 1870
- *Cypraea turdus winckworthi* (F. A. Schilder & M. Schilder, 1938)
- *Cypraea turdus zanzibarica* Sulliotti, 1911
- *Cypraea zanzibarica* Sulliotti, 1911
- *Erosaria (Erosaria) turdus* (Lamarck, 1810)
- *Erosaria (Erosaria) turdus winckworthi* F. A. Schilder & M. Schilder, 1938
- *Erosaria turdus* (Lamarck, 1810)
- *Erosaria turdus distinguenda* Schilder, 1927
- *Erosaria turdus kuwaitensis* Heiman, 2014
- *Erosaria turdus micheloi* Chiapponi, 2009
- *Erosaria turdus pardalina* (Dunker, 1852)

---

*Source: [Red Sea Creatures](https://redseacreatures.com/taxon/invertebrate/molluscs/cowries/thrush-cowrie)*
*Updated: August 29, 2026*