recommend collecting in the rain, in spite of the discomfort it entails. 

 AuRELE La Rocque 



^ 



Nature Provides Aid to Shell Collectors. It is by no means difficult to 

 collect big shells, once the collector has learned where to look for them. 

 However, for the smaller and smallest ones, it is a different matter, and it 

 often takes hours to locate one or two specimens of snail shells of, say, 

 xV inch in length. 



Fortunately, nature has provided an easier way that produces better 

 results. Various animals of medium size, both in fresh water and the ocean, 

 have developed a keen interest in tiny shells, though for reasons quite 

 different from the human collector's. For instance, the larvae of some 

 caddis flies use minute fresh-water shells, snails as well as clams, to cover 

 their cases. Thus the collector will find all the small species of shells that 

 live together with these caddis flies represented on their cases. 



On the seashore, especially in warm and tropical regions where the 

 beaches are covered with coralline growth and this growth is covered again 

 with sessile animals and sea plants that offer ideal hiding places, it is i 

 almost impossible to look for individual minute shells. In this situation 

 bigger animals, such as starfish, sea-cucumbers, and sea-slugs, feed upon 

 smaller animal life and, among it, on very little shells. By opening the 

 stomachs of these animals of prey, the collector will find, with far less 

 effort and in far shorter time than if he had to rely on his own resources, 

 numbers of the very tiniest shells that often contain animals still alive. — 

 Fritz Haas, Chicago Natural History Bulletin, June, 1953 



". . . But one day when you are out without your fancy collecting 

 equipment and find something worthwhile, remember that a finger and a 

 thumb make a quite good substitute for weak-spring tweezers, while a shirt 

 pocket can double for a vial or carton until you get your treasure home!" — 

 Fritz Haas 



(78) 



