English: Title: Bulletin of the Natural History Museum Zoology

Identifier: bulletinofnatura631nat Year: 1997 (1990s) Authors: Natural History Museum (London) Subjects: Publisher: Andover : Intercept Contributing Library: Natural History Museum Library, London Digitizing Sponsor: Natural History Museum Library, London

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Text Appearing Before Image: 52 A.V. SYSOEV AND J.D. TAYLOR

Text Appearing After Image: Fig. 1 Burchia spectabilis Sysoev & Taylor. Holotype. Shell height 36.9 mm. Fig. 2 Holotype, lateral view Fig. 3 Burchia spectabilis, holotype, radula teeth. Scale bar = 20|im. thick, white callus. The parietal nodule is moderately developed. The anal sinus is deep, U-shaped, broadly open, symmetrical, with the apex in the middle of subsutural ramp. The operculum is large and thick, oval, dark-brown, with a terminal nucleus, 7.2 x 3.2 mm. Shell height is 36.9 mm, body whorl height 19.5 mm, aperture height 14.4 mm, and shell diameter 10.4 mm. Paratype: shell height 12.5 mm. Radula. The radula (Fig. 3) consists of two rows of wishbone type marginal teeth only. The teeth are rather narrow, slightly curved and sharply pointed, without barb or cutting edge. The accessory limb is moderately large and attaches to the major limb about just behind the tip. Anatomy. (p. 81) The foregut anatomy is described in Kantor et al. 1997 Remarks. On shell characters, it is difficult to assign this species to any genus of Crassispirinae known from Western Australia and the entire Indo-Pacific. Its radular teeth are very similar to those of species of Inquisitor Hedley, 1918 (see Taylor & Wells, 1995). In general shell outline the new species resembles some species in- cluded by Wells (1994) in the genus Inquisitor Hedley, 1918 namely /. dampierius (Hedley, 1922) and, to a lesser extent, /. odhneri Wells, 1994, but is readily distinguished from them (and from any known turrid species) by the peculiar character of the sculpture of branching axial folds and widely spaced spiral grooves. However, the two latter species are themselves not very similar to the type-species of Inquisitor, I. sterrhus (Watson, 1881), and other typical representa- tives of the genus, which are characterized by a slender shell with a well differentiated and relatively long siphonal canal. Unfortunately, the radular characters of /. dampierius and /. odhneri are unknown. On the other hand, the radular and conchological characters of the new species correspond quite well to those of Burchia Bartsch, 1944, a Central American subgenus of Crassispira Swainson, 1840. The main feature distinguishing species of Burchia from the new species, besides the unique sculpture of the latter, is the presence of a thick periostracum. However, the character of periostracum is not usually considered to be of taxonomic importance at the generic level. Therefore, it seems reasonable under these circumstances to place the new species, at least provisionally, into Burchia. Acknowledgements. This species was collected during the Interna- tional Marine Biological Workshop on the Marine Fauna and Flora of the Houtman Abolhos Islands. We are grateful to the organiser Dr Fred Wells of the Western Australian Museum and the crew of the fisheries research vessesl 'Flinders' for facilities and logistic support.

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