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Abounding with shells; consisting of shells, or of a shell. "The shelly shore." Prior. Shrinks backward in his shelly cave. Shak.

One of a pair of shelly plates found in some cephalopods, as the ammonites.

hineura in which the body is naked or covered with slender spines or setæ, but is without shelly plates.

A shelly plate found in the terminal chambers of ammonite shells. Some authors consider them to be jaws; others, opercula.

The shelly skeleton of a sea urchin.

A stomach armed with chitinous or shelly plates or teeth, as in certain insects and mollusks. Gizzard shad (Zoöl.), an American herring (Dorosoma cepedianum) resembling the shad, but of little value. -- To fret the gizzard, to harass; to vex one's self; to worry. [Low] Hudibras. -- To stick in one's gizzard, to be di…

family Coccidæ (Margarodes formicarum), found in ants' nests in the Bahamas, and having a shelly covering. They are strung like beads, and made into necklaces by the natives. -- Ground pig (Zoöl.), a large, burrowing, African rodent (Aulacodus Swinderianus) about two feet long, allied to the porcupines but with harsh,…

Of or pertaining to an oyster, or to a shell; shelly. The crustaceous or ostreaceous body. Cudworth.

One of a pair of shelly plates that protect the siphon tubes of certain bivalves, as the Teredo. See Illust. of Teredo.

A shelly concretion, usually rounded, and having a brilliant luster, with varying tints, found in the mantle, or between the mantle and shell, of certain bivalve mollusks, especially in the pearl oysters and river mussels, and sometimes in certain univalves. It is usually due to a secretion of shelly substance around s…

A division of gastropod Mollusca, including the chitons. The back is covered by eight shelly plates. Called also Polyplacophora. See Illust. under Chiton, and Isopleura.

Any bivalve mollusk which secretes a shelly tube around its siphon, as the watering-shell.

Shelly. "Whelky pearls." Spenser.