RENNELL - AN OUT OF THE WAY CORAL ISLAND 



221 



A medium-sized specimen of 

 the robber crab of Rennell Is- 

 land. Total length 48 centi- 

 metres. 



very little known, we carefully preserved each little parasite which we 

 picked off one another. 



Needless to say, I have mentioned only a fraction of the animals collect- 

 ed during our month on Rennell Island, I have said nothing, for example, 

 of the many small creatures of the coral reef — • brilliantly coloured crabs 

 and shrimps, beautiful snails and bivalves, starfishes and brittle-stars, 

 worms, and so on. 



Although the impression may have been conveyed of a fauna as rich 

 as on larger tropical islands or on the mainland, in fact, after the first 

 thorough study of a given biotope, we came across many individuals belong- 

 ing to species which we had already collected. This leads me to think that 

 we succeeded in procuring a fairly full collection of the animals to be 

 found on Rennell Island at that season. 



We may now ask a few questions: Where did the fauna of Rennell 

 Island come from; and how did it get there? How did the animals succeed 

 in adapting themselves to the environment; and to what extent has the 

 environment affected their appearance? The answers to these questions 

 cannot really be given until the collected material has been studied by 

 specialists. But, as mentioned already, the birds of the island were fairly 

 well known, owing to the work of the Whitney Expedition. As I shall try 

 to show, this knowledge of the bird fauna has already brought us a good 

 step nearer to a solution of the problems. 



