About Phorcus sauciatus (F.C.L.Koch, 1845)
The shell of Phorcus sauciatus ranges between 11 mm and 27 mm in size. It is imperforate, rather thin, and shaped like a low cone. Both its overall form and coloration are extremely variable. The shell's ground color is greenish, particularly on the body whorl, and is usually purplish on the spire. It follows one of several common patterns: it may be surrounded by spiral bands of dark green, black, or red oblong spots connected by lighter color; it may be faintly mottled with reddish, with the ground color covered in fine oblique or zigzag lines. In some cases, the mottling and spiral/oblique streaking are so faint that the shell appears almost uniformly olivaceous, especially on the body whorl. The spire is conical and varies in how much it projects outward. The tiny apex is acute, reddish when it is not eroded. The sutures are deeply impressed. The shell holds six whorls, which are more or less noticeably marked with fine, irregular spiral striae or ridges. The periphery of the body whorl is either rounded or slightly keeled. The base of the shell is somewhat convex, more or less indented around the axis, and sometimes eroded in front of the aperture. The large aperture is very oblique. The outer lip has a black-spotted green edge, which is generally followed by a broad, thin opaque-white band; the inner area of the lip is nacreous and iridescent. The oblique columella has a thin edge, which curves outward in the middle. The columellar area is white and more or less eroded. The umbilical tract is covered by a thick pad of enamel. This species is found in the Eastern North Atlantic, along the coast of the Iberian Peninsula (mainland Portugal and Galicia) and in the Atlantic archipelagos of the Canary Islands, Madeira, and the eastern Azores.
