Xenophora deshayesi (Michelotti, 1847)

Taxonomy

Carrier Shell

Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Mollusca
Class: Gastropoda
Order: Littorinimorpha
Family: Xenophoridae
Genus: Xenophora
Species: Xenophora deshayesi
Author Citation (Michelotti, 1847)

Geological Time Scale

Eon: Phanerozoic
Era: Cenozoic
Period: Neogene
Sub Period: None
Epoch: Miocene
International Age: Langhian

Stratigraphy

unknown formation
Florianer Schichten

Provenance

Collector: Franz Bernhard
Date Collected: 11/29/2016
Acquired by: Field Collection

Dimensions

Height: 55 mm

Location

Höllerkogel Hill
St. Josef
Styria
Austria

• 2928
• austria
• badenian
• eastern alps
• florianer schichten
• langhian
• miocene
• styria
• styrian basin
• xenophora deshayesi

Comments

Carrier shell Xenophora deshayesi. This gastropod was a shell collector, having one of his collected items still attached (an olive snail, Olivella clavula (Lamarck, 1810)). The locations of the other shells or shell fragments are still visible. The specimen was found in two pieces and then glued back together

 

Shell collector? A friend found another one in this outcrop that collected only small quartz pebbles - obviously a mineral collector!

 

Exact locality is Höllerkogel-18 in my own documentation. It is a tiny outcrop (about 1-2 square meters) in a densely wooded, very steep area southwest of St. Josef, Styria, Austria. This small outcrop, composed of a medium grained, quartz-rich, somewhat limonitic sand yielded, from November 2016 to May 2018, at least 80 species of gastropods and bivalves; it is far from exhausted. Most of the fossils are characterized by a partial limonitic staining and usually very good preservation. The species X. deshayesi is not common there, but fragments are not very rare either.

The sediments in the area belong to the "Florianer Schichten", which are part of the western Styrian basin at the eastern margin of the Alps. The "Florianer Schichten" are about 15 Ma old (Langhian, or "Badenian" in Paratethys stratigraphic terms).