The first synthesis of New Zealand Mollusca was by F. W. Hutton (1873) in a publication entitled Catalogue of the New Zealand Mollusca. Following this work was contributed by papers by varios people, but it was not until 1913 that the magnificent work by H. Suter entitled The Manual of the New Zealand Mollusca was published,followed two years later by the relevant volume of plates. Many years were to follow before A. W. B. Powell produced and published his now famous New Zealand Mollusca (1979). This mammoth work brought together all of the known work on New Zealand Mollusca, by in this book Powell dedicated merely five pages to the family Volutidae. Other publications in which the Volutidae of New Zealand are featured, where by Weaver & duPont (1970) entitled the Living Volutes, and Poppe Goto's (1992) Volutes. Over the pass twenty-five years there has been a huge expansion in the activities of the benthic fisheries industry in New Zealand waters, as well as increased scientific work undertaken by the New Zealand Fisheries Research Development, NIWA. As a result, new fishing grounds have been discovered and these new areas have produced an amazing range of Volutidae, some previously known from only a few specimens and many new to science. Much confusion has occured with the identification of much of this new material, reslulting in misidentification and the overlooking of new discorveries. And so this work after many years of searching and research and many visits to the major museums of New Zealand and some of the nation's major shell collections, sets out for the first time a comprehensive monograph of the Volutidae of New Zealand.weiterlesen