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Hair accessories In the Philippine area there still remains the puzzling Midway and Kure Island sea shell illustrated as Cypraea latior Melvill by William Old, Jr., of the American Museum in the December 1963 issue of the Philippine Shell News, page 4. The status of the sea shell therein illustrated has not been settled and perhaps will not be until animal observation and dissection are carried out. It is unfortunate that no live specimens have been reported for study.
I have seen enough specimens (now over 200, mostly beach) of C. rashleighana from Kure, Midway and the Philippine chain to convince me that C. rashleighana is extremely variable as to length-width ratio. There are in the Bishop Museum and in my collection exact duplicates of the shell illustrated by Old and which were collected on Oahu. The variation from nearly spherical to relatively slender shells is also represented in specimens from Oahu. I have C. rashleighana 11mm and 41mm in length. Gigantism among most Philippine sea shells is a well known fact and undoubtedly C. rashleighana is similarly affected. This extreme variation is clearly shown in the photographs. I believe the cowry illustrated by Old to be the large, elongated, C. rashleighana. For comparison a similar wide variation in C. teres is also illustrated. However, each shell retains the specific characteristics already given. The fine labial teeth on the C. subteres are diagnostic and easily seen on the enlarged illustrations. (See Page 8).
In summary I conclude that Melvill's C. rashleighana is specifically similar (though smaller) to the Philippine C. rashleighana. The specific differences between C. rashleighana and C. teres are:
1. Smaller size and larger number of spots on the base of C. rashleighana.
2. Spots distributed on one-third to one-half of lateral margins of base.
3. Presence of a prominent columellar callus even on subadult forms of C. rashleighana.
4. Cypraea latior is properly a synonym of C. teres.
Hair accessories One day I discovered a juvenile one, red-colored and only one inch in length. In spite of my own rules of taking young shells, I decided to pick it up and to put it into an aquarium on board my ship. In this way I brought it home to Holland.
It has been most interesting to study this conch, day after day, during a period of almost two years. In that time this juvenile S. gallus made a complete red whorl. The food was no problem at all: there was enough algal growth on the glass and stones. With its two-inch long proboscis, the conch scratched the algae away and it was remarkable how far it could extend its proboscis. I have never observed it eating any animal matter.
The locomotion is also interesting: with the aid of the operculum the S. gallus moved, or better, jumped. The foot was only used as a sucker, just to fasten itself to the glass or stones in order to reach the higher places.
Ron Scaggs has come up with an excellent specimen of Bursa bufonia from 40 feet off Waianae, and Al Calabrese, diving in the same area brought up a Conus spiceri.
Eight Cypraea tigris schilderiana were brought up from a small area off Sandy Beach by Jack Uyemura, Ken Matsuda, Francis Shibata and Andy Shimazu recently. Seven of these beauties were nearly 5" in length and one measured 5-1/4".
Nelson Ching found six C. tigris in the comparatively shallow depth of 20 feet, off Waikiki. These sea shells were all very close together on the bottom.
Dr. Bill Stevens found a pair of Cypraea chinensis off Waianae at a depth of 45', but is still looking for his first C. tessellata.
The most outstanding find of the year came from 120 feet of water off Makua. A magnificent Tonna melanostoma, found live, by Lonnie Jordan measures 9-3/8 inches and the animal was too big to hide it the shallow sand.
During the two years that Ken White and I have been with Raytheon Service Co. in Saudi Arabia, we have become avid collectors of Red Sea sea shells.
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