Chaetopleura peruviana (Lamarck 1819)

Chile Central

Animal of medium to large size, up to 45 mm long in examined specimens. Oval to elongate oval, slightly depressed, color of tegmentum greenish-brown to dark brown. Head valve semicircular, front slope straight, posterior margin V-shaped. Intermediate valves broadly rectangular. Tail valve less than semicircular, almost as wide as head valve. Girdle profusely beset with very long (up to 10 mm) thick, coarse, corneous hairs, not only interspersed throughout girdle but in girdle bridges, protruding at sutures and extending over valves. Tegmentum pustulose sculptured with minute and neatly separated pustules, on the end valves the pustules are arranged in radiating rows. Body width/length, mean 0.66; height/length, mean 0.22 (After Ferreira 1983).

Kaas and Van Belle (1987) cited this species along the western coast of South America, between Cape San Lorenzo (1°4’0”S; 80°55’60”W), Ecuador to the Chonos Archipelago (45°0’0”S; 74°0’0”W), southern Chile. This species lives in the intertidal zone down to a depth of 40 m (Kaas and Van Belle 1987).