Titanostrombus goliath
Titanostrombus goliath, previously known as Lobatus goliath and Strombus goliath, common name the goliath conch, is a species of very large edible sea snail, a marine gastropod mollusk in the family Strombidae, the true conchs. T. goliath is one of the largest mollusks of the Western Atlantic Ocean, and also one of the largest species among the Strombidae. It was once considered endemic to Brazil, but specimens have also been recently found in the waters of Barbados. Brazilian common names for this species include búzio de chapéu or búzio, and búzio de aba or buzo in. Some phylogenetic hypotheses consider T. goliath as closely related to the queen conch, Aliger gigas.
Taxonomy
This species was first named as Strombus goliath by German theologian Johann Samuel Schröter in 1805. It is named after the biblical figure Goliath, who is traditionally considered to have been of tremendous size.The family Strombidae has undergone an extensive taxonomic revision recently and many subgenera, including Eustrombus, were elevated to genus level by some authors. Petuch recombined this species as Titanostrombus goliath in 2004, and Landau et al. recombined it as Lobatus goliath in 2008. In 2020, the species was recombined as Titanostrombus goliath by Maxwell and colleagues. The type locality of this species is Paracuru beach, north of Fortaleza, in Ceará state.
Phylogeny
The phylogenetic relationships among the Strombidae have been mainly accessed on two occasions, by Simone and Latiolais. However, Titanostrombus goliath was only included in Simone's analysis. Simone proposed a cladogram based on an extensive morpho-anatomical analysis of representatives of Aporrhaidae, Strombidae, Xenophoridae and Struthiolariidae, which included T. goliath.
With the exception of Lambis and Terebellum, the remaining taxa were previously allocated within the genus Strombus, including T. goliath. However, according to Simone, only Strombus gracilior, Strombus alatus and Strombus pugilis, the type species, remained within Strombus, as they constituted a distinct group based on at least five synapomorphies. The remaining taxa were previously considered as subgenera, and were elevated to genus level by Simone in the end of his analysis. The genus Eustrombus, in this case, included Eustrombus gigas and Eustrombus goliath, which were thus considered closely related.
Distribution
Titanostrombus goliath is found along the northeastern and southeastern coast of Brazil, including several Brazilian states, such as Ceará, Rio Grande do Norte, Pernambuco, Alagoas, Bahia and Espírito Santo and insular regions, such as Abrolhos Marine National Park.Since October 2008, a small population of both juvenile and adult specimens of Titanostrombus goliath was reported by fishermen to have been established in at least two locations along the west coast of Barbados. According to Professor Hazel A. Oxenford of the University of the West Indies, Cave Hill Campus, the means by which T. goliath came to dwell in Barbadian waters are not entirely clear; but the most likely explanation was that Goliath conch larvae were brought over from Brazilian to Barbadian waters by an 'extreme oceanographic event' involving the North Brazilian Current. Oxenford also assessed that the species was not invasive and unlikely to pose a threat to native marine flora and fauna, but opined that overfishing could cause severe depletion of its numbers.