(Claparède, 1870)

Description:
Body cylindrical, broad and flattened anteriorly.
Prostomium triangular, with frontal horns anteriorly and a broad, short caruncle posteriorly. With or without four eyes, without a median antenna. The long palps may reach segment 10, often lost.
Notopodial postchaetal lobes cirriform, connected by a ciliary band from the 3rd or 4th segment onwards.
Neuropodial postchaetal lobes on anterior four segments large, triangular, on the following segments smaller and broadly rounded.
First neuropodium with 1-3 big, strongly bent spines. All parapodia with capillary chaetae. From neuropodium 15-16 also bidentate hooded hooks and a strongly bent spine present. Segment 5-15 with more or less developed glandular areas with thin tapering glandular chaetae (S. bombyx-chaetae).
Pygidium with two filamentous cirri.

Size:
Up to 60 mm for 180 segments.

Colour:
Anteriorly pink, wine-red or green posteriorly.

Habitat:
On sand rarely on muddy or mixed sediments, eulittoral to 1000 m. Live in Y-shaped tubes, encrusted with sand. Tubes 2 mm in diameter and 25 cm long.

Distribution:
Arctic, North Pacific, North Atlantic to Mediterranean, whole North Sea to Öresund, English Channel, South Atlantic, South Pacific to Subantarctic.

Kingdom Animalia
Phylum Annelida
Class Polychaeta
Order Spionida
Family Spionidae
Genus Spiophanes
Species Spiophanes bombyx

Status in World Register of Marine Species

Accepted name: Spiophanes bombyx (Claparède, 1870)

Scientific synonyms and common names

Spio bombyx Claparède, 1870
Spiophanes bombyx Söderström, 1920

Hartmann-Schröder, G., 1996. Annelida, Borstenwürmer, Polychaeta. Tierwelt Deutschlands, 58: 1-648.

Imajima, M., 1991. Spionidae (Annelida: Polychaeta) from Japan VII: The genus Spiophanes . Bulletin of the Nat. Sci. Museum Series A, 17(3): 115-137.

Kirkegaard, J.B., 1996. Havbørsteorme II. Danmarks Fauna, 86: 1-451.

You can continue searching for Spiophanes bombyx on one of these Web sites:

Fauna Europaea (animals) | IOPI (plants) | NCBI (genetic)

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