Mollusks. 



5885 



Hanley give Loch Ranza, in forty fathoms, as a locality : my exam- 

 ples are from off Little Cumbrae lighthouse, the north of Great Cum- 

 brae, and the east side of Holy Island. 



Pecten similis {Pecten tmnidus). The only locality in which I 

 am aware of this shell being taken is among the old scallops of the 

 bed to the south-east of Hamilton's Rock, Lamlash ; I have there 

 taken three living examples, and numerous single valves. 



* 5, maximus. Occasional in deep water throughout the dis- 

 trict. Formerly abundant in Lamlash Bay, but, having been exten- 

 sively dredged for the market, it has become scarce. Dr. Lands- 

 borough mentions a very large specimen taken at Cumbrae measuring 

 " eight inches in length and seven and a half in breadth." 



* „ opercularis. Very common, and in certain spots exces- 

 sively abundant. There is a large bed of them extending from the 

 Tan Buoy, Cumbrae, in a northerly direction, from whence they are 

 extensively dredged for bait for the long lines. The most common 

 painting in the district is rich brown mottled with white, or the whole 

 of the costae (not merely the summits as in lineatus) pink with the 

 interstices white ; rich yellow and orange examples are also not un- 

 common, but I have never observed pure white examples, nor the 

 variety lineatus, among the thousands that have passed through my 

 hands in the Clyde. The name by which the scallops are known in 

 the West is " Clams." 



* „ islandicus. "Is an abundant fossil in the pleistocene 

 beds of the Clyde, and may be found in numbers at low water in the 

 Kyles of Bute, as was observed by Mr. Smith, of Jordan Hill," F, ^ H, 

 " Pecten islandicus, w^hich is regarded as a rare shell, is found in con- 

 siderable plenty in winter and spring on the shore of Fintry Bay, but 

 these are always dead, and I doubt not from some post-tertiary depo- 

 sit." — Lands, Excurs, p. 420. It is probable that the deposit from 

 which this shell was thus washed up some years ago in Fintry Bay is 

 now exhausted, as a single broken valve is all that has rewarded my 

 repeated search in that locality after gales. There can be no doubt 

 but that all the examples of this shell which have been taken in the 

 Clyde, either with the dredge or otherwise, are fossils, comrades of 

 Panopaea norvagica and Tellfna proxima, the characteristic forms 

 W'hich inhabited the waters of the Clyde during the glacial period. 



*Ostrea edulis {Ostrea parasitica), I am not aware of any spot in 

 the Clyde where oysters are sufficiently abundant to reward the 

 dredger for his trouble in procuring them ; a few, but only a few, may 

 occasionally be taken oS Fairleigh, and in other widely distant parts. 



