|
|
Assorted shell
Vital statistics on the Conus bullatus are as follows: Maximum length 65 mm and width, 28 mm. It is perfect in color,
pattern, and doesn't have a chip or mark on it.
In addition to the Conus bullatus we collected one Cypraea leviathan each, one Conus textile, and two Conus imperialis, plus
a few of the more common shells that I needed to fill out my collection.
Mal Loring and Reg Grim are also members of the Philippine Malacological Society.
probably I. perna L., as well as occasional specimens of Morula granulata. Specimens of the opisthobranch Pupa sulcata Gmelin
and Longchaeus sulcatus A. Ads. were burrowing in the sandy mud. On the low hanging branches of trees near the shoreline
Littornina scabra L. was collected, and on the rocks above the tide line Nerita plicata was again common.
Along the shore near Rikitea Nerita polita L. was fairly common burrowing in sand near boulders above the water line. In the
shallow water on rocks covered with algal growth and corallines I gathered specimens of Modiolus auriculatus Krauss,
Isognomon ?perna L., Morula (Semiricinula) fiscella Gmelin and Strombus mutabilis Swainson, the latter very common. In the
sand an occasional Gafrarium transversarium Desh. was uncovered.
High above the tide line, under debris of all kind, two species of Ellobiids were common: Melampus flavus Gmelin and Melampus
castaneus Muhlfeldt.
On Sunday the 18th of October we left Rikitea, sent on our way with heart warming farewells. We set our course for Tahiti
hoping to visit several atolls enroute. on the first day out we caught a yellow-fin tuna, and three days later a fine
mahimahi, both welcome additions to the rather uninspiring menus we had been reduced to.
I agree completely with the remarks made by Alison Kay (H.S.N., March, 1966) and by Harald Rehder (H.S.N., June, 1966)
regarding the evils of over-collecting live specimens of "rare" species. In addition to the need to protect molluscan
populations for the enjoyment of future generations of men, one could cite the potentially undesirable secondary effects of
upsetting natural predator-prey relationships, inter-specific competitive balances, etc.
There is another and much more fundamental philosophical point of view which needs to be stated, however. It has been
beautifully expressed by Henry Beston in The Outermost House (Holt, Rinehart and Winston, Inc., publishers) and is as
follows:
"We need another and a wiser and perhaps a more mystical concept of animals. Remote from universal nature, and living by
complicated artifice, man in civilization surveys the creatures through the glass of his knowledge and sees thereby a feather
magnified and the whole image in distortion. We patronize them for their incompleteness, for their tragic fate of having
taken form so far below ourselves. And therein we err, and greatly err. For the animal shall not be measured by man. In a
world older and more complete than ours they move finished and complete, gifted with extensions of the senses we have lost or
never attained, living by voices we shall never hear. They are not brethren, they are not underlings; they are other nations,
caught with ourselves in the net of life and time, fellow prisoners of the splendour and travail of the earth."
assorted shell,pokalets,craft,paua,shell bracelet,pearls,puka heishi,cyprea talpa,lambis troncata,assorted shell
Assorted shell leis pukka white capis shell white black pen squarecutrs shells necklaces lambis troncata heishe white abalone shells components turbo pitholatus melo shell cyprea mauretiana shell jewelry necklace cardium cardissa.
assorted shell
Shell
Bracelets
|
