Antarctoneptunea benthicola is a species of small-to-medium-sized predatory sea snail or whelk, a marine gastropod mollusc in the family Buccinidae, the true whelks.[1][3]
Antarctoneptunea benthicola is a small-to-medium-sized species of marine snail in the genus Antarctoneptunea, the shell reaches 100 mm in height and 40 mm in diameter.[4]
This species is endemic to New Zealand. The species occurs in deep-water,[4] and its range extends from off the northern coast of the North Island to the New Zealand Subantarctic Islands.[2]
A. benthicola also has a Pleistocene fossil record in the South Island.[5]
The species was formerly recognised as Penion benthicolus,[2][4][5] but evolutionary trees based on mitochondrial and nuclear ribosomal DNA sequence data, as well as geometric morphometric analysis of shell shape and size, indicate that the species belongs to Antarctoneptunea.[1][6]
A subspecies, Penion benthicolus delli Powell, 1971 was formerly recognized,[4] but this taxon has since been demonstrated to be indistinguishable from other P. benthicolus based on shell morphology.[2]
Antarctoneptunea benthicola is a species of small-to-medium-sized predatory sea snail or whelk, a marine gastropod mollusc in the family Buccinidae, the true whelks.
