Seashells by the Florida seashore

Shells from St. Augustine 10/26/07

2007-10-31T10:04:00.001-07:00

On a recent shelling trip to St. Augustine Inlet these specimens were found.

It was an overcast day, with a -0.5 tide. The shell above and below is the red to

orange color variation of
Fasciolaria hunteria (G. Perry, 1811)
This variation is found in the Mantanza inlet of St. Augustine

Below is a rare find in St. Augustine Inlet.
Melongena corona (Gmelin, 1791)
There were about 8 specimens found, the one below was the largest at 125.7mm.

Below top left corner is Cantharus (Gemphos) tinctus (Conrad, T. A., 1846).
The other 2 bivalves are Perna viridis (Linnaeus, 1758) This mussel is not native to
Florida waters as its true home is from the Asian waters. The suspected vector of
transmission is ballast water release from ship. They can grow to 7 inches(18cm).

Dupont Winning Exhibit "Cowries"

2006-11-07T16:21:00.000-08:00

I am very excited to share the 25 display cases of our Cowry Collection. Hope you enjoy them as much as I do. All nomenclature is current and according Felix Lorenz Systematic Levels in which there are 45 genera
based on DNA studies proposed by Chris Meyer 2004. Only 2 species
belong to the genus cypraea and that is tigris and pantherina.

Barycypraea...Muracypraea...Leporicypraea...Austrasiatica

Zolia

Umbilia...Zolia

Lyncina

Cypraea

Talparia...Luria...Austrocypraea

Chelycypraea...Arestoides...Macrocypraea

2006-11-07T09:58:00.000-08:00

2006-11-07T09:36:00.000-08:00

2006-11-07T08:58:00.000-08:00

A Day at the Beach

2006-07-14T11:12:00.000-07:00

A DAY at the BEACH.................

I found to the left, a very nice specimen of:

Busycon(Busycotypus)spiratum pyruloides (Say, 1822)

This spiratum has a higher spire than normal. It was buried in sand at lowest tide line. This species tends to be nacturnal. Its' favorite food supply is oysters and clams.

Specimens from the North Florida get about 75mm to 125mm. The aperature can be from dark purple to a golden yellow-orange. It lays its string egg capsules at the lowest tide line about April to May. Periostracum is thin and velvety. Mantel is white with a sufused black motteling covering.

> To the right is a nice specimen of:

Busycon (Busycon) carica (Gmelin, 1791).

The carica's from North Florida tend to have the

the chararistics of the subspecies eliceans(Monfort, 1810). (check below) Their spines are prominent, a

swelling running around the center girth of the body

whorl, and the aperture is usually a cream yellow to lavender and a dark orange.

<>Tellina (Acorylus) alternata Say,1822
common at the minus low tide line. It color is glossy
and variable: whitish, yellowish or flushed with pink.
Interior is glossy -yellow or pinkish. The average size is about 63mm when adult. This is a common shollow -water species.

>To the right is a nice specimen of a 375mm
Triplofusus gigantea (K iener, 1840) or as it's
common name the Florida Horse Conch. This is
a common species. This one was found at minus
low-tide buried in sand eating a B. carica. This species
does cannibilize its own. The horse conchs from this area are the form reevei Philippi, 1851. The last body
whorl is smooth with no knobs. The aperature is usually
some shade of orange. But can be a creamy-brown to

a pale cream. I have found an albino one a few weeks
ago--will post pixs later. The albino color of shell is
genetic. The animal does not differ from the norm.
Mating is from March to May. The young feed on
barnacles, clams, and boring clams. Finally, the shell
takes on a more elongate spindle shape and is always covered with Bryozoan.

< Spisula (Hemimactra) solidissima (Dillwyn, 1817) Common name is Atlantic Surf Clam. Common at minus lowtide. Color is yellowish white with a thin yellowish brown periostracum. Lives just under sand.

> Thais haemastoma floridana (Conrad, 1837)
This species is very variable. You can collect 30 of them at one time and think you have at least four different species-- but not. I will later show all the forms and colors.
Aperature is whit to salmon orange in color. Always is
incrusted with something. Found on peat rocks and
oyster beds. Mates all year long. Egg caspuals cand be
found all year long attached to whaterver is in water.
The egg caspuals vary in color from white, purple and
yellow or all at one time.
That is all for now. Happy shelling!!!! Jeff

Wolfman Fred

2006-07-12T13:53:00.000-07:00

WOLFMAN FRED

On June 30 My wife found an Euglandina rosea who she has since named Wolfman Fred. She created a little home for him and made it cozy, and filled it with other snails. It seems to be thriving and growing. Yesterday she photographed it eating 3 snails with 45 minutes and then turning around and ingesting a shell also. Interesting.

Dinner has arrived.

Bradybaena similaris

Greetings.

A very interesting thing occurred while watching Wolfman.

After he had eaten 3 "Bradys" he then proceeded to devour the empty shell.

After eating he then proceeded to head up the tank and went to "sleep".

Shell Show winners!!!!!!!

2006-06-22T07:26:00.000-07:00

OUR EXCITING NEWS!!!!

Well it has taken us 22 years but we finally achieved what we worked reallllly hard for. At this years Jacksonville Shell Show we won the duPont trophy!!

We displayed our Cowry collection consisting of 25 cases-50 feet of space and 202 different genus/species. It took up the whole aisle. With the average of 20 different shells in each case you can imagine the amount of labels I had to type out. I had to make sure of the correct author of the shell, and whether or not it was a subspecies or form of the major shell species. Then I had to convert any that listed the depth in feet to meters, that was fun. And then finally I had to make sure the place or local that the shell was found was a real place. Thank the goddess for A9.com. Homeland security is probably following my every movement! I have found so many places on the world that I never in my life would ever have heard about if I didn't do the labels. After that I had to proof read them and then print them up. Followed by cutting them down to size. Then I had to decide in which case would each genus fit in. They were set up by the correct genus name, not Cypraea so and so. Only the tigris and pantherina have the genus Cypraea. When the shells were then lined up I had to see if the genus would fit in the case. When it came to the Mauritia they had to go into 3 cases. Only because I had to buy every maculifera and mauritiana that came on eBay from sandybeaches2145. They have the best for these species.

After all that came the 3 day campaign of lining up the shells and taping down the labels and glue dotting the shell in place. I won't go in to what it took to get the shell to exhibit with the dorsum down and the teeth up. With that all done then came the posters. I still want to work on the posters for the next time I display.

"Kudos" go out to shellshowshells, cypraeaman, wattsdave, cyp_man, cypshells, sandybeaches2145, trextoo, sstdg and roeshells.

Also thanks to M&J Shells from Australia.

Last but not least to Dr. Felix Lorenz whom we meet at the COA a few weeks ago. His sharing of his knowledge and the beauty of his shells will be ever appreciated by us. So if you are in need of excellent shells, top quality and accurate nomeclature these are the best ones to buy from. If it wasn't for them I would not have a collection worth anything.

Mahalo nui loa! to all.

From the wife-Patty:

I want to thank Moshe Erlendur Okon a friend from Israel for trading shells with my hubby. As an honor to him he entered a case of landsnails and took home the special judges ribbon.