Sconsia is recognisable by its elongate, graceful shape with a short spire and a long, gradually tapered last whorl, without a shoulder angulation (at least in Neogene and Recent species; several Paleogene species have a marked shoulder angulation), by its sculpture almost solely of fine spiral cords with smooth crests, by the presence of varices on the spire of several species, and by its long, drawn out anterior end, merging imperceptibly into a completely untwisted siphonal canal, with no fasciole. The protoconch (in S. grayi) is very small, of only one whorl, simple and smooth, similar to that of Galeodea but a little taller. Bayer (1971: fig. 17A) illustrated the operculum of Sconsia grayi - which is closely similar to that of Galeodea species - and also (Bayer 1971: fig. 20D) illustrated the radula. The radula is very distinct from those of Galeodea species, and from any of the other taxa studied here, in having 5 large denticles on the free end of each inner marginal tooth, the second denticle as long as the main cusp of the tooth. The central and lateral teeth also have rather long, narrow denticles. The unusually numerous, brushlike denticles on the inner marginal tooth seem likely to be a generic character that would help determine whether Galeodea hoaraui should be referred to Sconsia.


REMARKS. — Dall (1909) pointed out that Early Cenozoic species of Sconsia and Galeodea are similar in shell morphology, i.e., they diverged quite early in Early Cenozoic time. Sconsia is a major Cenozoic genus in the western Atlantic area, including the southern USA, the Central American area and islands, and northern South America. The well-known type species, S. grayi (A. Adams) (= S. striata (Lamarck, 1816), preoccupied), also is moderately common along the southern coast of the Caribbean Sea at present, and occurs also in the Lesser Antilles. This has therefore been thought of as largely a western Atlantic genus, and certainly is limited to this area at present. Parth (1994) added significantly to the known diversity of the genus by describing the almost completely smooth species S. alexarthuri from the Lesser Antilles, where it lives in deeper water (300-400+ m) than S. grayi (c. 15-200+ m). However, Sconsia has a long fossil record in Europe and the Mediterranean area and in the tropical Indo-West Pacific (van Regteren Altena 1942) as well as the Americas.

Shell elongate oval, with revolving striae, bearing a single varix opposite the outer lip; canal short, slightly reflected; inner and outer lips plicate.