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Conus lischkeanus Weinkauff, 1875

Description: Shell moderately solid. Body whorl weakly convex at upper quarter, straight below, sculptured with weak spiral ribs on lower third. Shoulder angulate to subangulate. Spire low to medium in height, straight or concave in outline. Spire whorls flat or concave, with spiral grooves. Aperture moderately narrow, wider at base. Background colour white, with yellowish-tan on most of body whorl, either continuous or broken into axial streaks, leaving white spiral bands at shoulder, midbody and base.

Size: Up to 75 mm in length, commonly 30-50 mm

Distribution: A disjoint distribution in Indian and Pacific Oceans. In Indian Ocean: east Africa and Western Australia. In the north Pacific: Japan to Taiwan. In the south-west Pacific: the east coast of Australia (Swain Reefs to Sydney), eastwards to Lord Howe Island, New Caledonia, northern New Zealand and the Kermadec Islands.

Habitat: In eastern Australia, known from beach specimens, and subtidally 23-146 m. Rare in NSW.

Synonymy: Some authors (eg Wilson, 1994) are unconvinced at combining the disjoint distribution into a single species, and prefer to retain Conus kermadecensis Iredale, 1913 for the south-west Pacific populations.

Fig. 1    Kurnell, Sydney, NSW (C.071038)

 

Copyright Des Beechey 2004