50 — Deep-sea volute, Alcithoe lutea

Alcithoe lutea, Challenger Plateau, TAN0707.

Alcithoe lutea, Challenger Plateau, TAN0707.

Alcithoe lutea, Challenger Plateau, TAN0707.

Alcithoe lutea, on the seabed, Challenger
Plateau, TAN0707.

Alcithoe lutea (Watson, 1882) is quite a rare New Zealand volute (Family: Volutidae), and is only found in deep-water off the west coast of North Island.

These specimens came from NIWA, as part of the Oceans 20/20 Programme (voyage TAN0707).

In the last photo a live A. lutea can be seen moving on the seabed at a depth of about 550m. It's a little hard to see, since I sneakily took a shot of the TV screen from the deep towed camera while no one was looking—I wasn't supposed to, but I thought it was important to document it (asking for forgiveness rather than permission...). The volute is oriented with the spire pointing towards the top left and you can clearly see the long siphon pointing straight down.

Volutes are predators and have a long siphon, which they use to hunt for food. Apart from what you see here, very little is known regarding the distribution, numbers, or ecology of this species.

I'm indebted to NIWA for allowing me on this voyage and letting me have some of the dead shells they didn't need.
















More info: 

http://www.mollusca.co.nz/speciesdetail.php?speciesid=1204&species=Alcithoe%20lutea