Conus (Lautoconus) Monterosato, 1923

Psarras, Christos, Merle, Didier & Koskeridou, Efterpi, 2022, Late Miocene Conidae (Mollusca: Gastropoda) of Crete (Greece). Part 2, European Journal of Taxonomy 816, pp. 1-70 : 5

Subgenus Conus (Lautoconus) Monterosato, 1923

Type species

Conus mediterraneus Hwass in Bruguière, 1792 (Recent, Mediterranean Sea) by original designation.

Diagnosis

Moderately small to moderately large, turnip-shaped species. Medium-wide to wide shells and convex sides. Spire low to moderately high. Paucispiral protoconch. Early whorls ornamented with cords, which might persist on later spire whorls or appear as spiral threads. Subsutural flexure from very shallow to deep, usually moderately curved, moderately asymmetrical. colour pattern variable, displaying blotches, spiral rows of dots, dashes, and tents in multiple combinations.

Remarks

Puillandre et al. (2014, 2015) treated Lautoconus at the subgenus level. In this work we show two species that are large-sized ( Conus (Lautoconus) damianakisi sp. nov. and Conus (Lautoconus) lauriatragei sp. nov.). The species of the subgenus display an intraspecific morphological variability, as it is here shown for more than one species. The colour patterns are also variable, displaying patterns such as blotches, spiral rows of dots, dashes and tents in multiple combinations (see Monnier et al. 2018). We follow Harzhauser & Landau (2016) in excluding from this subgenus the species with tuberculate spire whorls. The oldest occurrence in Greece is reported from the early Miocene ( Thivaiou et al. 2019) by an incomplete specimen (AMPG(IV) 2473). However, the attribution to Lautoconus seems doubtful and this specimen could possibly belong to Conus (Eoconus) Tucker & Tenorio, 2009 (see more in Tracey et al. 2017).