Small Wentletrap

Type of larval development: planktotrophic, inferred from multispiral protoconch.

Shell up to 15 mm but usually smaller. Protoconch with four smooth whorls. Teloconch with 7-8 convex whorls and moderately deep suture, with 17-22 thin ribs per whorl, sometimes forming a blunt angle at a distance from the suture; interspaces smooth. Protoconch whitish to brownish, teleoconch white. Ths species may be difficult to distinguish from the southern European E. pulchellum (Bivona, 1832) which differs in having more crowded ribs, up to 30 per whorl, and in being broader at the same height.

Eastern Atlantic, from Norway to the Iberian peninsula and the Mediterranean, from the intertdal in the northern part of its range but rather deep (30-250 m) in the south. Gorringe, Josephine, Ampère and Seine seamounts, rare in 96-545 m