218 



The Razor Shells and Tellinas. 



effective bait for long and short lines. Plaice and dabs have a 

 strong partiality for them. The difficulty of securing the live 

 razor fish more often limits their use as bait, for their celerity 

 of escape is remarkable. A barbed wire thrust quickly into 

 the sand is commonly used for their capture. Kent and Essex 

 folks don't usually value them as food, but in Yorkshire they 

 are much liked as a culinary adjunct. Boiled razor fish are 

 regarded as delicious eating. 



(6) The TELLINAS are another set of bivalves whereon plaice 

 and dab revel in crunching them for food contents. Taken 

 generally they are small sized, most f to 1 inch in diameters, the 

 largest under 2 inches. They are residents in muddy sands, of 

 oval or somewhat triangular shape, and laterally compressed. 



The BALTIC TELLINA (T. balthica) is probably the most 

 abundant in the estuaries, equally of Thames, Crouch, Black- 

 water, Stour and Orwell. But it is also found in the neigh- 

 bourhood of Margate, Pegwell Bay, and various parts of S. 

 Kent, Dungeness beach for example. On the cockle grounds it 

 is numerous. In some places, e.g., Blyth Sand, there are great 

 banks of dead shells ; and hereabouts, as already mentioned, is 

 a favourite concentration area for flat fish at certain times of 

 the year. Its flatter shelled ally, the THIN TELLINA (T. tennis), 

 burrows scarcely so deep. During our strong easterly gales 

 this, the T. balthica, and at intervals the biggish T. crassa, get 

 surged into the shallows, an easy prey to the aforesaid mollusk- 

 eating flat fish. 



FIG. 24. 



Diagram to illustrate a 

 sectional view of the mud, 

 exposing a family congre- 

 gation of the Scrobicu- 

 laria in various positions. 

 The central one is shown 

 with fleshy foot extended 

 below, and the pair of long 

 syphon tubes stretched up- 

 wards to the water. 



