Relevant Synonyms - Misidentification -  photo: S. Gofas / Stuttgart Staatliches Museum für Naturkunde

SHORT DESCRIPTION Shell medium sized, thick, with regularly conical, shouldered body whorl and very low conical spire. Sculpture limited to faint spiral grooves at the extremity of the body whorl, towards the siphonal canal and spiral striae between the shoulder and the suture; early whorls of spire also tuberculate. Aperture elongated, narrow and parallel-sided, with thin outer lip. color : mostly brownish to greenish with spuerimposed darker interrupted spiral lines on the body whorl; a whitish zone along the suture and another one on mid-body whorl, marked with irregular axial flames. Inside of aperture greyish. common size : Mediterranean specimen 32.5 mm, a rather small size for the species which reaches over 60 mm in the Red Sea. DISTINGUISHING CHARACTERISTICS This species is distinguished from the native Conus mediterraneus (Hwass in Bruguière, 1792) by the more massive build, and by having knobs on the early spire whorls (an important character in Conus). BIOLOGY / ECOLOGY Unknown. habitat : shallow water in the Red Sea.

1st Mediterranean record Libya, 1986 [no collecting date]. DISTRIBUTION Worldwide: southern Red Sea (Röckel et al., 1995). Mediterranean: only from Marsa el Brega, Libya (Röckel, 1986). ESTABLISHMENT SUCCESS Extremely rare, only known from the original record (the illustrated specimen). speculated reasons for success : - MODE OF INTRODUCTION Unknown, possibly through maritime traffic linked with the oil industry. IMPORTANCE TO HUMANS None.

KEY REFERENCES Röckel D., 1986. Sensational find in the Mediterranean. La Conchiglia, 18(210-211): 12. Röckel D., Korn W. and Kohn A.J., 1995. Manual of the living Conidae. Vol. 1: Indo Pacific Region, Christa Hemmen, Wiesbaden, 517 p. [C. fumigatus, pp. 129-131, pl. 22 and 34].   FEEDBACK / COMMENTS TO AUTHORS

Last update : December 2003 ©ciesm 2002