Collectors

A Book For

Shell

SHELL collectors, who are a proliferating breed, will soon have a new book on the subject of their abiding passion. Marine Shells of the Pacific, by Walter O.

Cernohorsky, will be published by Pacific Publications shortly and will offer a good coverage of all aspects of conchology at a reason able price.

The main section of the book will cover descriptions and plates of between 400 and 500 shells.

There will also be chapters on the evolution of gastropods; the use of shells; classification of mollusca, notes on the shell, the animal and its radula; early col lections and collectors; collecting techniques; photography of shells, etc.

Glossary

The whole book will be well indexed and there will be a glossary of terms and other valuable information.

The author has aimed at giving the amateur conchologist a work ing knowledge of his hobby, a means of identifying his speci mens, and information on sub jects that are of greatest interest to him—something that, at pre sent, is available only in halt a dozen separate books.

Walter Cernohorsky’s interest in shells was aroused when he first explored Queensland’s Great Barrier Reef in 1951 and 1952.

It grew when he went to live in Fiji soon afterwards as chief

surveyor for the Emperor Gold Mining Company at Vatukoula.

His interest in shells soon be came more than an idle one. Dr.

F. A. Schilder, professor of zoology at Halle University, fostered in him an urge to adopt a scientific view of the subject instead of merely storing dead shells in drawers; and it was Dr.

Alison Kay, professor of zoology of the University of Hawaii, who started him off on the investiga tion of the anatomy of molluscs by offering helpful advice.

Encouragement

Other zoologists and curators of museums and other learned institutions also provided en couragement to carry on work on the little-known molluscan fauna of Fiji and other parts of the Pacific—something he has been ideally situated to do.

There is little he has not learned about Fiji’s reefs and their teeming life in the last 14 years, and he thus writes from experience as well as acquired scientific knowledge. Up to date, he has completed six parts of a study of molluscan fauna of the Fiji Islands.

Cernohorsky is now honorary conchologist to the Fiji Museum and has contributed articles and papers to the learned publications of the California Malacozoo logical Society, the Hawaiian Malacological Society, the Con chological Society of Great Britain and Ireland, and others.

Marine Shells of the Pacific will contain about 240 pages, including 60 plates and a score of diagrams.

The final price has not been fixed but it will not be less than S 6— considerably less than other books that attempt to cover the same ground.