Donax — Donax
Donax Debivort, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY SA 3.0

Shell · Genus

Donax

Coquina clams

Coquina or wedge clams (Donax) are the small, colourful, wedge-shaped bivalves that migrate up and down surf beaches with each wave, in rainbow colours on Florida and Gulf beaches. They are free beach finds and the cemented Pleistocene 'coquina' rock of Florida is made of them. Children's collections start here.

HabitatSurf zone of sandy beaches
RegionsWorldwide temperate and tropical
FamilyDonacidae
Authority (WoRMS)Linnaeus, 1758· WoRMS / MolluscaBase
Status (WoRMS)accepted· WoRMS / MolluscaBase
Extinct (WoRMS)no· WoRMS / MolluscaBase
Classification (WoRMS)Animalia › Mollusca › Bivalvia › Cardiida › Donacidae· WoRMS / MolluscaBase

CITES and protection

Not CITES-listed.

Care (Byne's disease)

Stable.

Elsewhere

Cite this article

Stratum Study. "Donax" (Shell family). Stratum Study pack 2026.09, as of 2026-09-19. https://stratum.black/study/shells/donax. Accessed 2026-09-20.

@misc{stratum-donax,
  title        = {Donax},
  author       = {{Stratum Study}},
  howpublished = {\url{https://stratum.black/study/shells/donax}},
  year         = {2026},
  note         = {Shell family article, Stratum Study pack 2026.09, as of 2026-09-19; sources: stratum, worms, wikidata, commons. Accessed 2026-09-20.}
}

Citations carry the pack version and the article's as-of date so they resolve to the same text later. The facts themselves belong to the sources listed below; cite those for the science.