Borsonia tatei
| Borsonia tatei Temporal range:
| |
|---|---|
| Holotype from Auckland War Memorial Museum | |
| Scientific classification | |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Mollusca |
| Class: | Gastropoda |
| Subclass: | Caenogastropoda |
| Order: | Neogastropoda |
| Family: | Borsoniidae |
| Genus: | Borsonia |
| Species: | †B. tatei
|
| Binomial name | |
| †Borsonia tatei A. W. B. Powell, 1944
| |
| Synonyms[1] | |
| |
Borsonia tatei is an extinct species of sea snail, a marine gastropod mollusc, in the family Borsoniidae.[2] Fossils of the species date to early Miocene strata of the Port Phillip Basin of Victoria, Australia.
Description
In the original description, Powell described the species as follows:
Species elongate-fusiform, differing from otwayensis in being more slender and with more numerous, slightly spinose axials, which persist over all post-nuclear whorls. Whorls angled at the middle. Axials strong, pointed at periphery, rapidly fading out on shoulder and considerably diminished at lower suture. Surface crowded with fine spiral threads and moderately strong cords, roughened by a surface texture resultant from dense axial growth lines. Shoulder with from 4-9 fine spiral threads. Five rather strong flat-topped spiral cords from periphery to lower suture, Interspaces slightly greater than width of cords; each interspace on last whorl develops a fine spiral thread. Spirals on base and neck linear-spaced, numerous, and much weaker than those on spire-whorls. Only one pillar plait showing, at about two-thirds height of aperture.[3]
The holotype of the species measures 21.7 mm (0.85 in) in height and has a diameter of 6.75 mm (0.266 in).[3] It differs from B. eocenica due to having cords and threads which are narrower or equal to the shell interspaces (wider in B. eocenica).[1]
Taxonomy
The species was first described by A. W. B. Powell in 1944.[3] The holotype was collected prior to 1944 from Torquay, Victoria, Australia. It is a part of the H. J. Finlay Collection which is held by the Auckland War Memorial Museum.[4][5]
In 1981, D. C. Long proposed a subspecies, Borsonia tatei eocenica, to describe similar appearance fossils dating to the late Eocene of the Otway Basin,[1][6] which by 1985 was being treated as its own species, Borsonia eocenica.[7]
Distribution
This extinct marine species occurs in early Miocene strata of the Port Phillip Basin of Victoria, Australia, including the Puebla Formation.[4][6]
References
- ^ a b c Long, D. C. (1981). "Late Eocene and Early Oligocene Turridae (Gastropoda: Prosobranchiata) of the Brown's Creek and Glen Aire Clays, Victoria, Australia" (PDF). Memoirs of the National Museum of Victoria. 42 (1): 15–55. doi:10.24199/J.MMV.1981.42.03. ISSN 0083-5986. Wikidata Q56195002.
- ^ Borsonia tatei A. W. B. Powell, 1944 †. Retrieved through: World Register of Marine Species on 25 February 2026.
- ^ a b c Powell, A. W. B. (1944). "The Australian Tertiary Mollusca of the Family Turridae". Records of the Auckland Institute and Museum. 3: 3–68. ISSN 0067-0464. JSTOR 42905993. Wikidata Q58676624. This article incorporates text from this source, which is under a CC BY 4.0 license.
- ^ a b Blom, Wilma M. (2025). "Annotated Catalogue of Fossil and Extant Molluscan Types in the Auckland War Memorial Museum". Bulletin of the Auckland Museum. 22. doi:10.32912/BULLETIN/22. ISSN 1176-3213. OCLC 1550165130. Wikidata Q135397912.
- ^ "Borsonia tatei". Collections Online. Auckland War Memorial Museum. Retrieved 23 February 2026.
- ^ a b Darragh, Thomas A. (August 2024). "A checklist of Australian marine Cenozoic Mollusca". Memoirs of Museum Victoria. 83: 37–206. doi:10.24199/J.MMV.2024.83.02. ISSN 1447-2546. Wikidata Q136396722.
- ^ Darragh, Thomas A. (January 1985). "Molluscan biogeography and biostratigraphy of the Tertiary of southeastern Australia". Alcheringa. 9 (2): 83–116. doi:10.1080/03115518508618960. ISSN 0311-5518. Wikidata Q58261326.