Spinicalliotropis Poppe, Tagaro & Dekker, 2006

Herbert, David G., 2024, The Vetigastropoda (Mollusca) of Walters Shoal, with descriptions of two new genera and thirty new species, European Journal of Taxonomy 923, pp. 1-119 : 29

Genus Spinicalliotropis Poppe, Tagaro & Dekker, 2006

Type species

Calliotropis (Spinicalliotropis) spinosa Poppe, Tagaro & Dekker, 2006 (original designation), Recent, Philippines.

Remarks

On the grounds of morphological and molecular evidence, Kano et al. (2009) demonstrated that Spinicalliotropis , originally proposed as a subgenus of Calliotropis , should be treated as a distinct genus. However, due to its unresolved position in their molecular analysis, Kano et al. (2009) considered it a taxon incertae sedis within the Seguenzioidea . Zhang & Zhang (2018) similarly found Calliotropis to be paraphyletic when species of Spinicalliotropis were included within it. For the present, since it is conchologically more similar to Calliotropis than to any of the varied assemblage of genera currently treated as unassigned seguenzioids, I maintain it in the Calliotropidae , but I follow Kano et al. (2009) in treating it as an entity distinct from Calliotropis .

In the original description of Spinicalliotropis, Poppe et al. (2006) indicated that the Caribbean Calliotropis clavata (Watson, 1879) was also referable to their new taxon and Kano et al. (2009) similarly included this species in their list of taxa that they considered to belong in Spinicalliotropis . If this proves to be the case, then Spinicalliotropis becomes a junior synonym of Echinogurges Quinn, 1979 , of which Trochus (Margarita) clavatus Watson, 1879 is the type species. Pending molecular evidence that the Caribbean and Indo-West Pacific species concerned are congeneric, I employ Spinicalliotropis for taxa from the latter region.