Solemyidae Gray, 1840

Saether, Kristian P., Jingeng, Sha, Little, Crispin T. S. & Campbell, Kathleen A., 2016, New records and a new species of bivalve (Mollusca: Bivalvia) from Miocene hydrocarbon seep deposits, North Island, New Zealand, Zootaxa 4154 (1), pp. 1-26 : 5

Family Solemyidae Gray, 1840

Remarks. Scarlato & Starobogatov (1979) introduced the family Acharacidae based on the type genus Acharax Dall, 1908 , but most authors consider this synonymous with the more familiar family Solemyidae Gray, 1840 . Acharacidae was recognized by Amler (1999) in his bivalve classification, but it was moved to the level of subfamily Acharacinae Scarlato & Starobogatov, 1979, by Bieler et al. (2010). The latest comprehensive synoptical bivalve classification by Carter et al. (2011), followed here, does not recognize Acharacidae , so we place our specimens in the Solemyidae .

Among reports of fossil seep solemyids, Acharax is reported extensively from Japan and southwestern and northwestern USA, with nine species so far having been identified: A. cretacea Kanie & Nishida, 2000 from northern Japan ( Amano et al. 2007; Jenkins et al. 2007a; Kiel et al. 2008a); A. dalli ( Clark, 1925) from northwestern USA (e.g. Goedert et al. 2003; Campbell & Bottjer 1993); A. gigas ( Kanno, 1960) from central Japan ( Kanie et al. 1999; Kurihara 2000; Majima et al. 2005); A. johnsoni ( Dall, 1891) from central Japan ( Nobuhara 2003); A. mikasaensis Kiel, Amano & Jenkins, 2008a from northern Japan ( Kiel et al. 2008a); A. stantoni ( Vokes, 1955) from south-western USA ( Kaim et al. 2014); A. tokunagai ( Yokoyama, 1925) from central Japan ( Shibasaki & Majima 1997); A. ventricosa ( Conrad, 1849) from north-western USA (Campbell & Nesbitt 2004; Nesbitt & Campbell 2004a, b; Campbell et al. 2006); and A. yokosukensis Kanie & Kuramochi, 1995 from central Japan (e.g. Amano & Kanno 1991; Kanie et al. 1992; Kanie 1996; Kanie & Sakai 1997; Amano 2003).

The only other solemyid genus to which seep fossil bivalves have been confidently assigned is Solemya Lamarck, 1818 , and these reports are less numerous. They include S. lomitensis Olsson, 1931 from Peru ( Olsson 1931), S. sulcifera Cooke, 1919 from Cuba ( Kiel & Peckmann 2007), S. cf. angusticaudata Nagao, 1932, from Japan ( Kanie et al. 1993) and S. ( Petrasma ) cf. woodwardiana Leckenby, 1859, from Svalbard ( Hryniewicz et al. 2014). Hryniewicz et al. (2016) report older Devonian aged solemyids from Morocco as Dystactella ? eisenmanni sp. nov. The only solemyids previously found in the New Zealand fossil record are Solemya from the Cretaceous ( Spencer et al. 2009), but Acharax clarificata Dell, 1995 , has been reported from modern New Zealand seep environments of the east coast of North Island ( Baco et al. 2010; Campbell et al. 2010).