Eulimella ataktos Warén, 1991

Høisaeter, Tore, 2014, The Pyramidellidae (Gastropoda, Heterobranchia) of Norway and adjacent waters. A taxonomic review, Fauna norvegica 34, pp. 7-78 : 57

Eulimella ataktos Warén, 1991

Figures 95-96

Eulimella ataktos n.sp. Warén, 1991:114

Eulimella ataktos Warén - Schander 1995 ; Peñas et al. 1996; Høisaeter 2009

Type material: Holotype SMNH 4100 .

Type locality: Grøtsundet , Troms (c. 69°50’N, 142-182 m)

Material seen: Norway - Hordaland, 1 spm (E 107-69b).

Diagnosis: Shell: Similar to E. ventricosa but wider, and adult specimens of the same size have one whorl less ( Warén 1991). Soft parts: Not known. Operculum: Not known.

Biology: Not known.

Distribution: In Norway known from the holotype from Grøtsundet and a specimen from Nordre Brattholmen, Hjeltefjorden (60°24’N, 100-180 m, gravel and coral rubble). In my material a specimen from Kobbeleia, east of Sotra (60°18’N, 70 m, fine sand, silt, Modiolula phaseolina gravel and small stones, coll. and leg. A. Warén), together with three specimens of E. ventricosa . Outside Norway a single shell reported from the Faroes ( Schander 1995), and from between 150 and 300 m off Catalonia in Spain ( Peñas et al. 1996).

Remarks: This species is not mentioned by van Aartsen (1994). Later (van Aartsen et al. 2000) listed several specimens from Cape Verde Islands as varieties of E. ventricosa (“..with planorboid protoconch, and smooth whorls with orthocline to slightly prosocline growth lines. Most of these shells are less slender than the European representatives of Eulimella ventricosa .”). E. ataktos was not mentioned as a possible candidate. Two SEM photos in Peñas et al. (1996) agree reasonably well with my specimens. According to Warén (1991) E. ataktos is distinguished from E. ventricosa also by the colour of the soft parts, “the soft parts of dried specimens of E. ventricosa are flesh coloured with occasional patches of bluishblackish while those of E. ataktos are bright pink.” ( Warén 1991:114). This is probably an unreliable character, as is evident from the soft part colour in the specimen in Figure 101 below. For comparison the top whorls of two shells of E. ventricosa are shown together with E. ataktos from the same sample (Figure 96). The question of whether E. ataktos is a valid species or only an extreme variety of E. ventricosa is still open.