Conch, << kongk or konch, >> is any large sea snail with a heavy, spiral shell. Conchs live mainly on the floor of tropical seas. There are many kinds of conchs. But in North America, the word conch most commonly means the queen conch, also called the pink conch. This conch ranges from Bermuda, the Bahamas, and the Florida Keys to the West Indies. It grows to a length of about 1 foot (30 centimeters).
The queen conch has a soft body with a long, muscular organ called a foot. It uses its operculum—a pointed, hornlike part at the back end of the foot—to pull itself along. The shell varies widely in color—from white through pink, yellow, and orange—and has hornlike knobs. The queen conch feeds on seaweed and plant fragments on the sea floor. After mating, the female lays a string of about 500,000 eggs. The eggs hatch after a few days. The tiny young float in the sea for several weeks before they settle on the bottom.
The flesh of the queen conch is valued as food and as fish bait. For thousands of years, people have used conch shells as trumpets. The shells also can be burned to make lime or ground up to make porcelain. They are prized by shell collectors. The overfishing of conchs has sharply reduced their numbers.
