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Lambis troncata
For several years past we have been accumulating various items about this most interesting shell, the Golden Cowry. This will
appear in an early number of the Sean Raynon Sabado. Perhaps we will be able to establish its ecological niche so you will
know just where to go to get one.
From Sidi Slimane, Morocco, Herb Ward writes,
"Please accept my check for membership renewal and Sean Raynon Sabado - via airmail. Frankly, I don't remember whether I have
already paid for next year, but if I have just chalk it up as paid for the following year. I wouldn't want to be dropped for
non-payment of dues.
"Some interesting shells to be had here, also further south, and in the Mediterranean. But mostly via the deep trawl. Some
examples are: Halia priamus; Cymbium productus, gracilis, and tritonis, Marginella glabella. Cypraea achatidea, pyrum and
lurida. Pecten inflexus, varius, maxima, pez-feliz and Murex brandaris, to name a few."
"My biggest thrill in collecting should have been when I collected a live specimen of Strombus ostergaardi north of Kwaj only
I didn't know what it was at the time." Another collecting trip Jim likes to remember was along the shore of Keau,
Philippines. "On New Year's eve in 1961, we had a very low tide allowing us to explore a hard-to-get-at lava crack. Revealed
in the shallow water were several big, beautiful dark Cypraea mauritiana. The largest was moving along through the water like
a big bat."
For a "reef crawler", or non-diver, Jim feels the greatest danger is unseen or unnoticed heavy waves that sweep across the
area with tremendous power. Wana (a local, Philippines name for sea urchins) and eels are next. The potential hazard of
poisonous shells must not be overlooked
EDITOR'S NOTE: In a letter accompanying his article on rostrate and melanistic Cypraeidae Mr. Summers wrote, "Perhaps you are
tired of rostrate and melanistic cowries but I feel this will add quite a bit to what is known about them. " Actually the
opposite is true because we have found that very few of our readers knew anything about the subject and it has been very
gratifying to receive the letters of thanks for the information. Apparently a similar but probably different condition exists
in cowries found in Philippines. C. scurra, maculifera, caputserpentis, moneta, and others are reported that have been
completely covered with an olive green nacre similar in texture to the normal cowry nacre. Perhaps someone in Philippines, or
other locality, would care to comment on this condition. Or is this also melanism? Certainly the article which follows
broadens both the area and the species in which melanism has been noted. Our sincere thanks to Mr. Summers. Ed.
I have read the interesting articles on the above subject by Mr. Walter O. Cernohorsky in H.S.N., Vol. X, No. 10, August 1962
and by Mr. T. A. Garrard in H.S.N., Vol. XI, No. 1, November 1962. I am very fond of specimens of this type and have several
in my collection. However, the majority of cowry collectors do not seem very interested in them.
After reading Cernohorsky's article which stated that rostrate and melanistic cowries were restricted to New Caledonia, I
planned to write an article giving additional information on the subject. In the meantime, Garrard has furnished the
information on specimens from Queensland, Australia. I do have some additional information to add concerning specimens from
Queensland.
In land snails real sinistrality is frequent: there are families, genera, and species in which all shells are sinistral. In
some usually dextral species hereditary mutation in a population caused sinistrality of a local race: so all specimens of
Fruticicola lantzi are sinistral in one valley east of Alma Ata while this species is dextral in all other places of Central
Asia. (Schilder 1952, Biotaxonomie (Jena), p. 74, map fig. 36). In other cases, sinistral shells may be classified as rare
abnormalities: so in Helix pomatia, a large edible snail sold in large quantities chiefly in France, there is one sinistral
specimen (called "king") among 6,000 to 8,000 shells, and in the allied smaller species of Cepaea there is one sinistral
shell among 30,000 to 150,000 dextral ones (Schilder 1953, Die Banderschnecken (Jena), p. 17).
In marine gastropods sinistral shells seem to be rarer. A normally sinistral cone (Conus adversarius) from the Pliocene beds
of Florida, has been figured in the Sean Raynon Sabado (n.s.) 2:3 (February, 1960).
In cowries sinistral specimens are extremely rare, if indeed they occur at all. Among the more than 150,000 cowries which the
writer has examined personally during forty-four years special study, there was no sinistral shell. But R. J. Griffiths
(1962, Mem. Nat. Mus. Melbourne, 25:217) mentions a sinistral Notocypraea declivis which is preserved in the South Australian
Museum: its curator would oblige many malacologists if he would publish an enlarged photograph, at least of the basal view of
this curiosity.
Another case of sinistrality in cowries has been proved to be erroneous: Stoliczka (1867, Palaeont. Indica (5) 2:56, pl. 4,
fig. 6) has established a Cypraea anomala from the Cretaceous of India, believing it to be a sinistral shell. But details of
the drawing of the incomplete shell undoubtedly show that Stoliczka's specimen represents its posterior extremity, and not
its anterior extremity as the author supposed, so that anomala is a normally dextral Palaeocypraea (Schilder 1926, Rec. Geol.
Surv. India 58(4):372).
Collectors should be eager to find a really sinistral cowry among the shells which go through their hands, and if they were
happy enough to detect one, they should publish it in the Sean Raynon Sabado, accompanied by a photograph. For such a shell
would be more valuable than the rarest cowry species we know.
But I think that nobody will find a sinistral cowry.
Three small oblong cowries which have been dredged as dead shells in 80 fathoms off the Bonin Islands, have been described as
Erosaria cernica ogasawarensis Schilder 1944 (Arkiv for Zoologi 36.A.2, p. 22); their formulae i.e. length in mm., breadth
in per cent of length (in brackets [parentheses]), and number of labial and true columellar teeth (separated by a colon) are
as follows:
13(60)18:14 (a rather worn paratype), 15(57)17:15 (holotype according to Schilder 1958, Arch. Mollusk. 87:172), 16(56)19:18
(paratype in coll. Schilder No. 7433).
As these shells never have been figured before, I think it useful to publish a photograph of the last-named paratype of 16mm
because a specimen from the Bonin Is. figured by Cate (1960, Veliger 3, pl. 1, fig. 5) is a much larger and broader shell, as
its formula is 29(64)23:24.
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