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Family Oreasteridae

Asterodiscus Gray, 1847

Asterodiscus truncatus Coleman

• Coleman, H. L., 1911. Mem. Aust. Mus. 4, p. 699, Pl. 83.
• Powell, A. W. B., 1937. Trans. Roy. Soc. N.Z., 67, p. 78, Pl. 16.

Material Examined: Three specimens, two of them in the Dominion Museum, all received by courtey of Dr. Powell. None of them are from deep water, but the species is included here because it occurs in deep water (47–200 fathoms) off the east Australian coast and in the Great Australian Bight, and it is highly probable that deep-water examples from New Zealand will be discovered. The New Zealand specimens all come from the Hauraki region, Powell's first specimen being from west of Hen and Chicken Islands, in 29 fathoms.

Although H. L. Clark (1946) stated that nothing is recorded as to the colour of the species in life, Powell (1937) had in fact given a careful description, "ground colour of the abactinal surface chrome, heavily blotched with vermilion; larger tubercles and superomarginal plates mauve to dull purple; ground colour of actinal surface chrome with vermilion abactinal patches encroaching slightly at the margins; larger tubercles mauve, ambulacral regions pale grey to mauve". The colour of dried material which I have seen is a dark reddish-brown, dull yellow below.