By local fisherman using tangle net, Punta Engano, Lapu-Lapu City, Mactan Island, Philippines, 21.2mm., early 2014.
The « Convoluted False Triton » is a delicate muricid widely distributed throughout the Indo-Pacific, ranging from South Africa to Red Sea and widely across the western Pacific. Typical of genus Phyllocoma, it greatly resembles a miniature version of trumpet tritons and Broderip originally assigned it wrongly to Ranellidae, under genus Triton; hence the comrnon name « False Triton ». Currently genus Phyllocoma contains strictly three species, the other two being P. scalariformis (Broderip, 1833) and P. platyca Houart, 2001; all clearly differ in sculpture and pose no difficulty in identification. It is an uncommon carnivorous gastropod found mostly on rocky bottoms or under rocks, and appears to inhabit a wide bathymetric range from about 10m down to more than 500m. The shell may vary somewhat in stoutness, it is very brittle and many specimens have the apex naturally damaged during the animal's life. Typical shell length around 20mm., very large specimens may exceed 30mm.

Indo-West Pacific. Fossil shells have been collected from Pleistocene deposits on Oahu, Hawaiian Islands, but there are no Recent records to indicate that this species now lives in Hawaiian waters (Kay 1979: 239). New for Tonga.