Cerithium columna Sowerby, 1834. Length, 43 mm; diameter, 28 mm. Shell: conic-elongate; solid; spirally corded and axially noduled; fawn. Spire: protoconch of three and one-quarter red-brown whorls with axial threads and spiral striae; eight to ten whorls; suture shallow; indistinct. Sculpture: distinct spiral cords of greater diameter than the interspaces crossing sharply noduled axial ribs. Aperture: ovate; outer lip flaring and fluted by the external sculpture; siphonal canal short, briefly recurved. Color: fawn; often encrusted with coralline algae.
C. columna is fairly common, occurring both in the intertidal in tide pools and subtidally to depths of 100 m. Pleistocene fossils are reported from Molokai (Ostergaard, 1939). This species is well known throughout the Indo-West Pacific.