Ovatipsa chinensis
A rare 4cm find on reefs in Bali and Kwajalein Atoll, warm water 25 to 31C, glossy shell hiding under a mottled mantle year-round.
A small, glossy oval shell around 4cm long, usually mottled brown, tan and cream with a pale ridge line down the back. Underwater you will often see the fleshy mantle drawn up over the shell, textured and speckled, so the smooth shell itself is only partly visible. Look on the underside of ledges and in rubble rather than out in the open, since it tends to stay tucked against the reef.
Divers mostly find this one wedged into crevices or tucked under coral ledges during the day, mantle drawn over the shell so it can look like a lump of encrusting growth at first glance. It moves slowly and shows little reaction to divers, relying on staying hidden rather than fleeing. Night dives and careful torch scanning of rubble patches and undercuts give the better odds of spotting one.
Like other cowries, it grazes on algae and detritus at night and pulls its mantle fully over the shell as both camouflage and protection, which is why the glossy shell surface is rarely seen exposed underwater.
No clear season shows up in the sighting data, and its comfort range of 25.3 to 31.3C matches warm tropical reefs year-round, so any month in Bali or Kwajalein is fair game.
Logged more often in Indonesia than anywhere else, with sightings concentrated around Bali, and also confirmed at Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands. It is not a species you go looking for on a checklist dive, it turns up as a rare find while scanning ledges and rubble on reefs in these areas.
Mapping where Chinese Cowry is logged…
Sightings cluster around Bali in Indonesia, with a further confirmed record at Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands. It is a rare, incidental find rather than a species tied to one famous site.
There is no detected season in the sighting data. It sits comfortably in 25.3 to 31.3C water, so it can turn up on tropical reefs at any time of year.
Look for a small glossy oval shell around 4cm, mottled brown and cream, often mostly hidden under a speckled fleshy mantle. It sits tucked into ledges and rubble rather than sitting out in the open.
Around 4cm in length, small enough that it is easy to swim straight past one wedged into a crevice.
It draws its fleshy mantle right over its shell during the day, which camouflages it against the reef and hides the glossy shell surface that gives cowries their name.
Site and sighting data is aggregated from diver logs, iNaturalist and GBIF. For taxonomy and conservation status:
Elysia Timida
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