Range: Andaman Is., E. Malaysia. Indonesia, New Guinea, Philippines to Japan.

Description: Medium-sized to moderately large. Moderately solid to solid. Last whorl conical, ventricosely conical or conoid-cylindrical: outline almost straight to moderately convex. Shoulder usually angulate, smooth to tuberculate. Spire of low to moderate height, occasionally stepped: outline straight to concave. Larval shell of about 2.5 whorls, maximum diameter 0.8-1.0 mm. First 4-9 postnuclear whorls tuberculate. Teleoconch sutural ramps flat to slightly concave, with 1-2 increasing to 4-7 spiral grooves. Sometimes fine and weak on all ramps. Last whorl variable in sculpture; shells with weak and smooth spiral ribs on basal fourth intergrade with shells with granulose ribs from base to shoulder. Surface sculpture uniform in some fornis, highly variable in others.

Ground colour white to tan. Pattern of last whorl ranges from uniformly white to blackish brown spiral banding. Spiral colour bands vary from yellow to blackish brown; a spiral ground-colour band usually at or just below centre, another sometimes within apical third, and another rarely on basal third. Spiral rows of brown dots extend from base to shoulder but vary considerably in number and arrangement, sometimes fusing into solid spiral or axial lines, occasionally restricted to spiral ribs or completely absent. Base and siphonal fasciole sometimes coloured like adjacent part of last whorl, more often contrasting yellow to pink or brown to purple. Larval shell white, pink or brown; adjacent postnuclear sutural ramps usually of same colour. Late sutural ramps white to brown. Immaculate or with radial lines and streaks in various shades of brown; occasionally spire pattern reduced to variably set dots between shoulder tubercles. Aperture white, brownish or bluish white, often darker brown to violet-brown at anterior end.

Periostracum grey to olive, thin, almost opaque, slightly rough.

Radular teeth with an adapical barb opposite a larger second barb: long and fine serration present; a backwardpointing cusp protrudes about 1/7 of the length from the base: basal spur absent (Troschel, 1868: Nybakken, 1990).

Habitat and Habits: From infralittoral fringe to about 60 m; on sand. Radular tooth structure suggests molluscivory (Nybakken, 1990). Egg diameter of 591 µm in Philippines, predicts completely benthic development (Perron & Kohn, 1985).

Discussion: Although C. f urvus is extremely variable in its conchological characters, it is quite distinct from all other congeners. It appears to be characterized by the isolation of local populations. Because of the variability within and intergrades among these populations, it is hard to decide whether they deserve recognition as geographic subspecies. We regard the lollowing nominal species-group taxa as forms of C. f urvus: - C. aegrotus (Pl. 19, Fig. 23): With dotted spiral lines on white ground. Similar in shape to form cecilei. - C. albicans (Pl. 19, Fig. 25): Last whorl conical. Shoulder often distinctly tuberculate. Colour white, except for violet base; with sparse remnantsof spirally aligned dots on last whorl. Form albicans may be considered a subspecies from N. Indonesia and Palawan, S.W. Philippines. - C. albus (PI. 19, Fig. 29): Completely white. Spire low (RSH 0.09). Postnuclear whorls tuberculate except for last 2 whorls. Teleoconch sutural ramps with 3-6 spiral striae in late whorls. Last whorl conical (RD 0.57), with a few spiral ribs at base. We provisionally assign C. albus to C. f urvus, because no shell characters justify separation at the species level. Coomans et al. (1980) synonymized C. albus with C. magus. However, the latter species differs in its stronger spiral sculpture on the late sutural ramps and its adapically more convex outline of the last whorl.
- C. cecilei: Last whorl conical, outline slightly convex. Shoulder often undulate. Sculpture of last whorl consists of minutely granulose spiral ribs at base. Last whorl white to brown, with spiral rows of dots, brown to brownish violet at base. - C. crepusculum: Last whorl conical, outline almost straight; colour of yellow tones; pattern without spiral lines; base violet. - C. granifer (Pl. 19, Figs. 19, 20): Last whorl conical, outline convex. Shoulder often undulate. Number of tuberculate poshuclear whorls comparatively high. Granulose spiral ribs often extend from base to shoulder. Ground colour white to brown. Spiral rows of brown dots on and between granulose ribs. Intergrades with form cecilei in shape in Sulu Archipelago, Philippines, but differs in its granulose surface. - C. lignarius (Pl. 19, Fig. 28): Lighter brown than typical form of C. f urvus, with a darker base and solid spiral lines on last whorl. - C. neobuxeus (Pl. 19, Fig. 15): Very similar to form cecilei in colour pattern, except for a lighter base. - C. nivalis (Pl. 19, Fig. 27): Last whorl conical to conoid-cylindrical, slightly narrower than in other forms (RD 0.50-0.58 vs. 0.5 1-0.63 in most forms). Early postnuclear whorls with very weak tubercles, teleoconch sutural ramps with line to obsolete spiral sculpture. Form nivalis may be a subspecies of C. f urvus, from the northern shores of the Sibuyan Sea between southern Luzon and northern Samar. - C. polygrammus (Pl. 19, Fig. 24): Essentially similar to form lignarius. - C. turritinus (Pl. 19, Fig. 26): Last whorl conoid-cylindrical; spire often stepped. Larval shell white. Last whorl yellowish brown, with a white spiral band at centre and without spiral rows of dots; base of the same colour as rest of last whorl. - A very distinctive shape and colour variant is known from Philippines (Pl. 19, Figs. 30, 31). Last whorl conical to conoid-cylindrical and broader than in all other forms (RD 0.61-0.69 vs. 0.50-0.63). Entire shell white to pale cream, except for yellowish pink apex and base. We provisionally assign these shells to C. f urvus as an unnamed form. Information on range and conchological variation is inadequate to permit a more definitive conclusion.

C. furvus range map

This section contains verbatim reproductions of the accounts of 316 species of Conus from the Indo-Pacific region, from Manual of the Living Conidae, by Röckel, Korn and Kohn (1995). They are reproduced with the kind permission of the present publisher, Conchbooks.

All plates and figures referred to in the text are also in Röckel, Korn & Kohn, 1995. Manual of the Living Conidae Vol. 1: Indo-Pacific Region.

The range maps have been modified so that each species account has it own map, rather than one map that showed the ranges of several species in the original work. This was necessary because each species account is on a separate page on the website and not confined to the order of accounts in the book.