The Echinoid Directory

Contributed by Andreas Kroh, March 2007

Koehleraster Lambert & Thiéry, 1921, p. 331

Diagnostic Features	Test of moderate size, ovoid, margin broadly rounded, oral surface sunken towards the peristome. Apical disc central, tetrabasal or monobasal with four genital pores. Ambulacra narrow, petals undeveloped, typically with simple ambulacral plating throughout, pores single throughout. Primary tubercles perforate throughout, glassy tubercles small, inconspicous. Periproct oral, very large, longitudinally elongate, close to the peristome. Peristome large, central or slightly anterior, oblique, depressed. Bourrelets absent. Phyllodes undeveloped. No buccal pores. No naked sternal area.
Distribution	?Eocene, Miocene to recent, Paratethys Sea (fossil), Indian Ocean.
Name gender	masculine
Type	Echinoneus abnormalis de Loriol, 1883, p. 41, pl. 5, fig. 2; by orginal designation.
Species Included	K. abnormalis (de Loriol, 1883); Recent, Indo-Pacific (tropical part), 25-85 m depth. K. aff. abnormalis (de Loriol, 1883); Middle Miocene, Austria. Also possibly K.? burgeri (Grant & Hertlein, 1938); Pliocene, California. K.? michaleti (Cotteau, 1894); Upper Eocene, France
Classification and/or Status	Irregularia; Echinoneioida, Echinoneidae
Remarks	Koehleraster is very similar to Echinoneus and Micropetalon. It can be distinguished from Echinoneus by the perforated tubercles, and from Micropetalon by the perforated tubercles and the orientation of the periproct (oblique in the type species of Micropetalon). Mortensen (1948a: 74, 81) was uncertain if the peforate tubercles alone justified the generic distinction and tentatively placed the genus into the synonymy of Echinoneus. P. de Loriol. 1883. Catalogue Raisonne des Echinodermes recueillis par M. V. Robillard a l\'IIle Maurice. Memoires de la Societe de Physique et d\'Histoire Naturelle de Geneve 28(8): 1-64, 6 pls. J. Lambert & P. Thiery. 1909-1925. Essai de nomenclature raisonnee des echinides. Libraire Septime Ferriere, Chaumont, 607 pp., 15 pls. T. Mortensen. 1948. A monograph of the Echinoidea: 4 (1): Holectypoida, Cassiduloida. Reitzel, Copenhagen, 363 pp., 14 pls. A. Kroh. 2005. Catalogus Fossilium Austriae. Band 2. Echinoidea neogenica. Oesterreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften, Wien, lvi+210 pp., 82 pls.