Hairy Chiton

Acanthochitona zelandica

Description 6

A medium sized chiton, 19 to 31mm long, 9 to 20mm wide. The plates are brown, greenish, grey, or yellowish, sometimes dotted with brown, some plates with a brown or black line at the summit, margined with white. The narrow, greenish or yellowish girdle has 18 tufts of long light-blue or white bristles, 14 at the corners of the plates and four around the front plate. The visible plates appear wedge shaped with grooves from back to front. (front plate crescent shaped, rear plate oval and very small - ed.)

Anterior valve finely granulose, apex smooth, sometimes carinated and beaked. Intermediate valves more or less distinctly beaked ; latero-pleural areas covered with closely crowded, ovate, flattened granules ; dorsal areas narrowly triangular, closely and finely striated longitudinally.

Distribution 6

Intertidal, found under stones and in tidal pools. North Island, South Island, Stewart Island and Auckland Islands.

Synonyms 6

Chiton zelandicus (Quoy and Gaimard, 1835) (original combination)
Acanthochoetes hookeri (Gray, 1843)
Acanthochiton zealandicus doubtessensis (Ashby, 1926)
Acanthochiton zelandicus amplificatus (Iredale and Hull, 1930)
Acanthochiton zelandicus (Quoy and Gaimard, 1835)
http://www.marinespecies.org/aphia.php?p=taxdetails&id=367630

Acanthochiton brookesi (Ashby, 1926)
http://www.gns.cri.nz/static/Mollusca/taxa/BM481.html

References 6

New Zealand Mollusca, Marine Land and Freshwater Shells, A W B Powell, 1979
Manual of the New Zealand Mollusca. Henry Suter, 1913

Sources and Credits

  1. (c) tangatawhenua, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC), uploaded by tangatawhenua
  2. (c) matt-walters, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC), uploaded by matt-walters
  3. (c) Lisa Bennett, some rights reserved (CC BY), uploaded by Lisa Bennett
  4. (c) Tony Wills, some rights reserved (CC BY-SA), uploaded by Tony Wills
  5. Tony Wills, no known copyright restrictions (public domain), uploaded by Tony Wills
  6. (c) Tony Wills, some rights reserved (CC BY-SA)

More Info

iNaturalist NZ Map

Depth intertidal
Places Auckland Islands, North Island, South Island, Stewart Island