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Conus charigi (Ladd - Macneil, 1960)
Descrizione.
Shell small, stout, with a strongly coronated spire of medium height; body whorl with strongly tubercled, rather widely spaced spiral ribs; tubercles of each spiral are imperfectly aligned with those above and below over much of the shell (1).
Measurements of the holotype, British Museum (Natural History) No. GG. 9145: length 30,6 mm, diameter 14,0 mm; a paratype, USNM 250168: length 16,7 mm, diameter 9,8 mm.
In general form and size, C. charigi suggests the granulated form of C. boeticus Reeve (*), a species living in Indonesia and the Moluccas (Coomans, 1973, p. 322-323), but the fossil is more strongly coronated and the spiral lines of tubercles on the body whorl are larger and more widely spaced.
C. charigi resembles strongly coronated shells of the variable living species, C. sulcatus Hwass, but the fossil has much better developed tubercles on the body whorl and the spirals are more widely spaced and are in a single series.
C. deburghiae Sowerby (1887, p. 2, pl. 1, fig. 7), a living species from Indonesia and the Moluccas, has a granulated form, but it is larger and more slender than C. charigi. The species is named for Dr. Alan Jack Charig of the British Museum (Natural History), who first examined the fossil collected by Ronald Bartholomew, recognizing it as a coarsely tubercled undescribed form (1).
Occurrence.
Holotype from station RB44, Viti Levu, Fiji; age, probably Pliocene (Tertiary h).
Figured paratype and two other shells from station 160 on Viti Levu; age, early Miocene (Tertiary f).
The figured paratype and one of the two shells with it are small; the other is as large as the holotype but is incomplete.
(*) Conus boeticus appears to be related to Conus tjilonganensis as its descendant. Conus suduirauti (Raybaudi, 2004) was not yet known in 1960.
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(**) Conus axelrodi appears to be related to Conus tjilonganensis as its descendant.
Bibliografia
