(Gmelin, 1791)
Description (shell):
Shell slightly translucent, not glossy, with a relatively high spire with a stepped profile due to flattening of the subsutural area of each whorl. The shell has six tumid whorls; the last whorl is large and occupies about 80 % of shell height. Sutures are deep. Growth lines marked. The oval aperture occupies about two thirds of shell height, the lip is everted at the base of columella. An umbilicus is absent. The outer lip arises at right angles to the surface of the last whorl. The columella may be narrowed near its mid point by a sinus along its umbilical border, but there is only rarely a chink-like umbilicus.
Size:
Up to 2.5 x 1.8 cm.
Colour:
White, yellowed by the periostracum.
Animal:
The animal resembles other naticids. It is cream with many opaque white points. Eyes hardly visible.
Habitat:
On sandy bottoms to 80 m deep; never intertidal.
Distribution:
A circumpolar species recorded locally only from the northern parts of the North Sea (Distr. A. islandica).