A colossal volutid, the “Beck’s Volute” ranges from Espiritu Santo, Brazil to Tierra del Fuego, Argentina and is the largest volute of South America, Due to its large size, it is recently growing in importance as seafood locally and the shell is a popular decorative item. A carnivorous and predatory gastropod feeding chiefly on other gastropods and bivalves, it inhabits soft bottoms of moderate depths around -20~80m and is locally common. Typical shell size around 300mm, extremely large specimens may exceed even 490mm. Specimens are very prone to damage from encrusting polychaete tubes and barnacles, large specimens with clean surface are very difficult to obtain. The large protoconch is characterised by a sharp protrusion posteriorily. It often carries irregular ‘lightning’ patterns of ziczac lines, but the occurence of these is highly variable and many specimens lack any significant patterning. The outer lip flares slightly in geronic specimens. – Adapted from Chong Chen’s post.