Molluscs from a shallow bay of King George Island (Antarctica, South Shetland Islands): An annotated checklist with new distributional records

During the 31 st Soviet Antarctic expedition in 1986/87, the mollusc fauna was studied at several stations in Ardley Cove, a bay of Maxwell Bay on King George Island, and in Fildes Strait (between King George Island and Nelson Island). The depths sampled were between the intertidal and 100 metres. While the two intertidal stations were visited several times, the deeper stations were usually sampled once.

A total of 59 mollusc taxa were identified, of which 27 belonged to Bivalvia, 29 to Gastropoda and 3 to Polyplacophora. Some of these species were discovered for the first time in the area of King George Island. While some species were found exclusively in the intertidal zone, others were restricted to the greater depths.

Only very few species were detected from eulittoral down to depths of 100 metres. Particularly worth mentioning are the taxonomic analyses of the species within the genera Altenaeum Spaink, 1972 and Cuspidaria Nardo, 1840 as well as the species Onoba filostria (Melvill & Standen, 1912) and Kidderia subquadrata (Pelseneer, 1903). The importance of a thorough taxonomic analysis for the composition of the mollusc fauna, especially with regard to climateinduced changes in the Antarctic, is discussed.