SOME MARINE MOLLUSCAN SHELLS OF BEAUFORT AND 



VICINITY 



By Arthur P. Jacot 



Plates 11-13. 



While at Beaufort, N. C, during the summers of 1915 and 1916, 

 the writer took the opportunity to collect what marine molluscan 

 shells were procurable by beach picking. A study of the material 

 thus gathered and of the fragmentary and scattered condition of the 

 literature on the mollusca of this region have led me to present this 

 summary for what possible short cuts it might give future workers on 

 this subject. 



Four papers on the shells of this region have come to my notice. 

 In 1860 W. Stimpson published a paper, Mollusca of Beaufort, N. C, 

 in the Am. Jour. Sci., ser. II, vol. XXIX, p. 442. When reading 

 his article it should be born in mind that he confounds Cape Lookout 

 with Cape Hatteras. Eleven years later E. Coues included in his 

 Notes on the Natural History of Fort Macon and Vicinity in the Proc. 

 Phil. Acad. Sci., vol. XXIII, p. 120 (131), 1871, a list of the shells 

 of this region. Again eleven years later H. L. Osburn published 

 in the Studies from Biol. Lab. John Hopkins Uni., vol. IV, p. 64, 

 1887, some interesting Notes on Mollusca Observed at Beaufort, N. C. 

 Then in 1912, H. D. Aller's Notes on Distribution of the More Common 

 Bivalves of Beaufort, N. C. appeared in this Journal, vol. XXVIII, 

 p. 76. Kurtz, Catalogue of the Shells of N. & S. Carolina, 1860, is 

 a list without locahties. Thus this locality is no new field and prom- 

 ises to be one of importance. 



Beaufort is the mid-most of North Carolina's harbors or outlets 

 to the sea. Situated 10 miles northwest of Cape Lookout and 95 miles 

 northeast of Cape Fear, it is the only outlet for the waters of the ex- 

 tensive sounds lying back of and between these two Capes. Thus 

 two distinct faunal areas are brought in direct contact and an outside 

 or deep-water silt fauna added. 



The Molluscan fauna of this region is typical of the east coast 

 of the United States and yet is so situated as to receive West Indian 

 as well as northern species. Two distinct faunas are represented, 

 that of the outer beach or sea and that of the sounds or quiet water. 

 The sea fauna is one characteristic of the whole coast of the state, 

 i. e., a hard sand bottom with mud opposite the inlets. The only 



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