Cerithium (Triforis) inflata Watson, 1880

Albano, Paolo G., Bakker, Piet A. J. & Sabelli, Bruno, 2019, Annotated catalogue of the types of Triphoridae (Mollusca, Gastropoda) in the Natural History Museum of the United Kingdom, London, Zoosystematics and Evolution 95 (1), pp. 161-308 : 161

Cerithium (Triforis) inflata Watson, 1880

Cerithium (Triforis) inflata Watson 1880: 103-104, not illustrated. Illustration available in Watson (1886): 564-565, pl. XL, fig. 1.

Type locality.

"Lat. 18°38'30"N, long. 65°5'30"W, St. Thomas, North of Culebra Island, Danish West Indies" (Puerto Rico).

Type material.

Lectotype: NHMUK 1887.2.9.1766, designated by Rolán and Fernández-Garcés (2008) (not seen) .

Original description.

St. 24. Mar. 25, 1873. Lat. 18°38'30"K, long. 65°5'30"W. St. Thomas, N. of Culebra Island, Danish West Indies. 390 fms. Mud.

Shell.- Small, narrow, conical, with a blunt inflated apex, solid, opaque, glossy. Sculpture. Longitudinals-there are on the last whorl 16 rows of small rounded but not blunt tubercles, which more or less continuously run obliquely down the spire in lines from right to left; the hollows which part them are in form much like themselves; there are also faint microscopic scratches on the lines of growth. Spirals-on each whorl the tubercles are arranged in two spiral rows, in which the tubercles have their sharp tips tilted up the spire, and they are parted by a triangular shaped furrow, narrower than the spirals of tubercles. Below the under row of tubercles is a broader furrow, in the bottom of which runs the suture on the spireward face of a fine rounded thread occupying the extreme upper edge of the subjacent whorl. This thread is undulated rather than tubercled where it crosses the longitudinal rows; on the spireward side this thread is defined by a minute deep square-bottomed trench, while on the basal side it lies close in to the foot of the upper spiral row of tubercles. Round the edge of the base is a slight sharp narrow keel, which the succeeding whorl as it grows buries in the spiral thread mentioned above. At 0.004 from the edge, and there forming a ledge, the whole centre of the base is slightly projected: with this exception, the flat and scarcely conical base has no ornamentation beyond the radiating lines of growth and the microscopic spirals, which, though visible on the rest of the shell, are, as usual, more distinct on the base. Colour dull translucent white. Spire high, narrow, and conical. Apex blunt and inflated. The two embryonic whorls are larger, but otherwise very much like those of C. metula, Lov., being turban-shaped and projecting beyond the succeeding whorls; they are glossy and quite smooth but for some very faint microscopic longitudinal and spiral lines. Whorls 13, of very gradual increase, flat on the sides; the base, too, is flat, and very little conical. Suture linear, almost hidden by the overlap of the subjacent whorl. Mouth very small and square, with a minute, round, very short canal in front, whose edges are reverted all round. Outer lip broken. Pillar very small, extremely short, straight, but reverted at the point. Inner lip not fully formed. H. 0.2. B. 0.06. Penultimate whorl 0.02. Mouth, length 0.028, breadth 0.025.

This species, which in shape resembles T. suturalis, Ad. & Rve., may be easily distinguished from that species by the absence of the deep suture and by the inflated apex. From C. (T.) hebes, W., its sculpture and its apex distinguish it at once.

Remarks.

Rolán and Fernández-Garcés (2008) recently treated this species and illustrated the lectotype.