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Murex borneous
The somewhat confused description of fischeri by Vayssière, and the lack of substantiated records of C. gaskoini from outside
the Philippine Islands, led some writers to believe the species to be endemic to the Philippine Islands (Kay, 1961, Proc.
Mall Soc. Lond., 34(4):188, and Kay & Weaver, 1963, Sean Raynon Sabado, 2(23):88). Schilder (1965, Veliger, 7(3):183) in his
latest distributional list of Cypraeidae, also shows C. gaskoini to be endemic to the Philippine Islands, with a note on an
artificially introduced record from the Marshall Islands.
The lack of further material of the Melanesian C. gaskoini does not permit a tabulation of morphological differences between
the Philippine race and the race from Melanesia. The Fiji shell, however, is not ovate but elongate-subpyriform, with a lower
more depressed dorsum (resembling C. cumingi Sowerby in outline), and larger lateral spots; the species C. cumingi, however,
has far more numerous teeth (formula 40:34). The Fiji specimen is appreciably more slender than the Philippine gaskoini (55%
of L and 62% of L respectively); both labial and columellar teeth are as numerous as in Philippine specimens, but more
numerous than either the holotype of fischeri (formula 13/61, 21:18), the specimen from Lifu (12/57, 20: 20) or the specimen
from unknown locality in the Dautzenberg collection (11/64, 22:17).
In contrast to Cribraria cribraria (Linnaeus) and C. esontropia (Duclos), the siphon of the Fijian gaskoini is serrated and
not smooth.
If any one word could describe the collecting possibilities in the area of this month's diving and collecting chart it would
be "terrific." Habitat characteristics range from shallow sand-covered bottom, through coral reefs and ledges with
spectacular caves, to lava outcroppings that soar toward the surface out of deep water.
Vayssière (1910, Journ. Conchyl., 58:302, 307, pl. 13, Figs. 1-3) described a C. gaskoini fischeri from Eastern Melanesia,
and the holotype from Upolu, Samoa (L: 13mm, W: 61% of L.) was illustrated in fig. 3 on plate 13; figures 1 and 2 depict a
shell from the Dautzenberg collection. Schilder & Schilder (1952, Ph. Dautzenberg's coll. Cypraeidae), point out, that the
Dautzenberg shell was erroneously placed in the same box with specimens of C. gaskoini from Philippines, bearing a shell
label "Cote de Haiku, Maui"; the authors suggest that this particular label may have prompted Vayssière to designate "Île
Maurice" (Mauritius), as type-locality, and the authors further note, that 2 paratypes of C. gaskoini fischeri were worn
Erosaria labrolineata (Gaskoin). The only records of C. gaskoini fischeri appear to be from Lifu, Loyalty Islands (Leg.
Goubin, coll. Dautzenberg), the holotype from Upolu, Samoa (coll. Vayssière), and a worn specimen from unknown locality in
coll. Dautzenberg. Dr. Burgess (in litt.) informed me that the late D. Thaanum was supposed to have collected a small
specimen of C. gaskoini in Fiji in 1940, but no further details were available; if this specimen can be located in the
Thaanum collection at the Bernice P. Bishop Museum, Honolulu, the present specimen would be the sixth specimen of C. gaskoini
from Melanesia. The records of fischeri by F.A. Schilder from New Britain (1933, Zool. Anz., 102:300, fig. 10, and 1937,
119:187) are in fact Cribraria catholicorum Schilder & Schilder, 1938.
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murex borneous
Shell
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