1907 273 



LAND AND FRESHWATER MOLLUSCA. 



BY R. WEI.CH, M.R.I.A., AND A. W. STELFOX. 



The fact that we are at present engaged in completing a 

 census of the land and freshwater Molluscs of Ireland, made 

 a visit to the Cork district of special interest to us. In old 

 lists, the county of Cork was taken as one, and in the Concho- 

 logical Society's census it is divided, by the River Lee and the 

 western shore of Cork Harbour, into North and South Cork 

 (Watson's Botanical Divisions), while in Mr. Praeger's division 

 of Ireland, which we will follow in this paper, Cork is divided 

 into three vice-counties — West, Mid, and East Cork. This 

 fact made it very difficult to decide in which vice-county 

 many of the old records should go, though we were able to 

 settle some by the aid of Mr. R. A. Phillips of Cork, whose 

 list, published in the Journal of the Cork Historical and 

 Archaeological Society, September, 1904, was of the greatest 

 importance to us. There being many blanks for some of the 

 divisions, we were glad to take advantage of the Conference 

 excursions, which enabled us to collect in all of the vice- 

 counties of Cork, as well as in Waterford. We were fortunate 

 in having the assistance of such old and experienced workers 

 as Messrs. J. W. Taylor, F.L-S > and W. Denison Roebuck, 

 F.L-S., of Leeds, R. Standen of Manchester, and J. N. Milne 

 of Belfast, while Mr. R. A. Phillip stwice joined our party. 

 Much help was also lent us by Mrs. Praeger, Messrs. Hinch, 

 W. H. Patterson, R. Patterson, Galhvay, Balfour Browne, 

 Jackson, and Rankin. The area visited was more like that 

 surveyed during the Kenmare Conference of 1898 than that of 

 Galway in 1895, or Sligo in 1904. It covered, however, a 

 much larger field than any of these, and with the exception of 

 coast sand-dunes, provided more variety of ground. The 

 only excursion on which we found suitable habitats for the 

 xerophiles was that to Youghal, and even there this was not 

 typical and was restricted in area. As against this, we had a 

 great variety of habitats for the freshwater species, as the 

 marshes at Youghal and Ballyphehane, also the River Lee at 

 Carrigrohane and The Gearagh. Practically all our collecting 

 was on the Carboniferous slates, grits, and shales, or the slates 



