Good stuff!

Regarding NZ Trophoninae:

Comptella... I have 2 nes species from canyons off the SE of the country

Axymene is being resurrected (notsure of justification)

Chathamidia is without doubt congeneric with Surculina... which
Kantor, Bouchet & Oleinik 2001 synonymized with Exilia
(Turbinellidae: Ptychatractinae), and with whom I fully concur

Paratrophon I cannot place in Trophoninae

"Terefundus" axirugosus (and one undesrcibed Oligocene sp) belongs in
an undescribed genus probably outside Trophoninae

Xymene is polyphyletic; the type sp X. plebeius appears nontrophonine
but is certainly muricid

Xymenopsis appears cloes to Xymene ss and may be a synonym

Zeatrophon is probably a synonym of Trophon; X. mortenseni, X.
caudatinus & X. huttoni do not appear to be congeneric with sexually
dimorphic X. ambiguus or X. pulcherrimus. In X. ambiguus females have
normal Trophon lcollabral lamellae with spiral cords; males have
broad heavy spiral cords only on the later whorls.

Typhinae has characters placing it firmly in Muricidae. I agree that
taxa with varical tubes do not belong here (Prototyphis, Pterotyphis).

--
Andrew Grebneff
Dunedin, New Zealand
64 (3) 473-8863
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Fossil preparator
Seashell, Macintosh & VW/Toyota van nut
I want your sinistral gastropods!