Talopena carmesina

Taxobox
name = "Talopena carmesina"
status =
regnum = Animalia
phylum = Mollusca
classis = Gastropoda
subclassis = Prosobranchia
ordo = Archaeogastropoda
superfamilia = Trochacea
familia = Trochidae
genus = "Talopena"
species = "T. carmesina"
binomial = "Talopena carmesina"
binomial_authority = (Webster, 1908)
synonyms = "Trochus carmesinus" Webster, 1908

"Talopena carmesina" is a species of small sea snail, a marine gastropod mollusc in the family Trochidae, the top snails.

Distribution

This species is endemic to northern New Zealand, at Cape Maria van Diemen and Great Barrier Island.

Habitat

This rare top snail is found in beach drift, and the actual habitat is unknown.

hell description

The shell is rather small, moderately solid, depressed-trochiform, with bi-angulate whorls, a weak subsutural bulge, and a much stronger peripheral angle. The umbilicus is deep and narrow, with two spiral ridges, the inner umbilical one indistinct, but nevertheless, it terminates in a distinct denticle near the top of the pillar, and has a decided cleft between it and the parietal wall. Sculpture is of very numerous linear-spaced, fine spiral lirations, both on the upper and lower surfaces, but smooth within the umbilicus.

The external shell coloration is crimson, except for the umbilicus which is white.

The shell height is up to 6 mm, and the width is up to 8 mm.

References

* Powell A. W. B., "New Zealand Mollusca", William Collins Publishers Ltd, Auckland, New Zealand 1979 ISBN 0-00-216906-1