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Philippines seashells
Philippines seashells In the Philippine Shell News August 1967, page 5, Mr. Walter O. Cernohorsky, of Fiji, illustrated and discussed a sea shell that he had identified as C. rashleighana. The sea shell illustrated lacked the visible specific characteristics of C. rashleighana that I and many other serious sea shell collectors had come to associate with this species. I immediately wrote Walter stating my opinion and the reasons for it.
I believed that the most obvious specific difference between C. rashleighana and C. teres is the smaller brownish spots on C. rashleighana that cover one-third to one-half of the base, both labial and columellar surfaces. Also of specific importance is the pronounced and sharp columellar callus found on adult C. rashleighana that allows identification almost by palpation alone. This callus is never present on any specimen of C. teres that I have seen.
Cernohorsky immediately answered my letter refuting my conclusions and quoted Melvill's original description, of which I was well aware, and which mentioned neither the smaller spots, their distribution or the prominent columellar callus. Cernohorsky was certainly reinforced in his views by the fact that Prof. Dr. F. A. Schilder had seen the shell in question and also identified it as C. rashleighana.
Melvill's original description figured a plump C. rashleighana, typical in appearance to our Philippine sea shell, with spots on both sides of the base, in the 1888 Journal of Conchology Vol. V, Plate II, Fig. 26. He figured only a dorsal view in the Memoirs and Proceedings of the Manchester Literary and Philosophical Society, 1888. Melvill and Standen very clearly illustrated a typical C. rashleighana (as we know it) in the Journal of Conchology 1895, Plate II, Figs. 7 and 8.
This was indeed a puzzling and contradictory situation. Schilder had seen the specimens of C. rashleighana in the Dautzenberg collection and also those of the British Museum. The opinion of such an authority should be respected.
To settle the controversy examination of the types was necessary, and in late 1967 a European visit provided the opportunity.
Philippines seashells I think that these Cribrarula from the Marquesas Is. should be separated from the far more Western C. fischeri as geographical subspecies
The Junior Division of the Philippine Shell spent a day at Ala Moana Reef, for an outing, and had a wonderful time. Among the finds were seven Conus vexillum and three Cypraea moneta.
Again this month, Ron Scaggs has some unusual finds. He brought up a Pecten langfordi from 95' at Pearl Harbor and then found a pair of Cymatium vespaceum from 50' off Waikiki.
George Cook is proudly showing a beautiful Conus elisae which he found while snorkelling in 12 inches of water on the North Shore.
Andy Butler brought a live Cymatium clandestinum out of the Waikiki area from about 65' and Al Calabrese collected 3 Conus bullatus from 130 ft. at Pearl Harbor and a Primovula species from 210 ft. at Pearl Harbor and then found a Cyp. chinensis in 6" of water off Fort Kam.
Al's diving partner, John Earle, collected a live Cypraea becki at 130' off Makua and Paul Suzuki found a live C. rashleighana at 15' at Keehi, Maui.
While reef crawling, Jim Fair found a very recently dead Cyp. vitellus at Makapuu in 12" of water, and Tom Fair brought up a Conus textile which may very well be close to world record size (nearly 5") from 10 ft. at Punaluu. The C. textile has not been officially measured yet, and photo will be in a later Sean Raynon Sabado issue.
Gerald Bluehdorn found three Cypraea lynx, live, at Hickam Reef, measuring 43mm, 44mm, and 52mm. On the same day he found a 6-1/4 inch Conus leopardus and on the next day, same place, in 4 to 5 feet of water found a 2-7/8" live Cypraea vitellus.
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