Dear Phil,

A few suggestions from the UK:

>
>So, my questions are:
>
>1)  What are your prefered types of localities for
>finding micro shells?

**  In the UK, beaches with good larger shells are often but not always
good for micros; beaches with no shells or with accumulations of seaweed
are usually (but not always) poor prospects.
(In other countries where there is less tidal range, or where the sea
gets deep very quickly, it's harder to find accumulations of good micros
on beaches;  here, I also look underwater for small pockets of fine
debris including shell fragments, and scoop then into a ziplock; but
it's usually less productive ....)

>
>2) What is the strangest place you have found micros?
>
>3) What special tools do you use? (and, of course, how
>do you use them)?

**  To scoop up lines of micro accumulation on beaches, I use an old
credit card - that way you get most of the micros and as little of the
underlying heavy sand as possible.   Having rinsed and dried the sample
to get rid of salt (and any bits of floating seaweed - but don't lose
small light shells at the same time!), sieves are vital to grade the
sample, to make sorting easier, and to get rid of the fine sand;  I
usually use 4mm, 2mm, 1mm and 500 micron sieves.  There is usually very
little or nothing below 500 micron;  the most productive fractions are
usually 1-2 and 2-4 mm.  To sort out the micros, I use a small binocular
microscope at x 8.  I put a thin scatter of the sample on a plastic
box-lid on which I've drawn black tramlines (with a fibre tip pen) at
the right width for the field of view to cover a bit more than the
distance between two adjacent tramlines; that way I can scan the
contents of the whole box-lid without missing any or wasting time.  It's
important not to try to sort too much sample at the same time, as you
inevitably miss things.  To pick the good shells up, I use either a fine
wet paintbrush or, for heavier shells/fractions, watch-maker's tweezers.
I find it's better to put all the shells I pick out from one fraction
into a sample tube or tray and then sort and identify them at the end -
it saves a lot of time.  If a sample is unproductive, or produces only
battered shells, it's usually better to dump it and try a better place
or a better sample.

>
>4) Where can one find the most productive grunge; what
>kinds of situations result in a good concentration of
>micro mollusks?
>

** Along strandlines in the UK I look, usually fairly high up the beach,
for narrow lines of small fragments of light but not floating debris -
things like bits of coralline seaweed, small littorinids and trochids;
then get down on your hands and knees and follow the line along to find
he best concentration.  Best places are often (but not always) at the
ends of beaches, where they curve more sharply.


>5) How do you store and display your shells?
>
>

**  I haven't found an ideal solution.  What I use at the moment are
very small plastic boxes (about 35mm x 25mm, with an internal height of
3 or 6 mm) which are available here in the UK and reasonably cheap, and
small gelatine capsules.  The smaller micros go into capsules and then
into a 6 mm box which holds a capsule and its label; the larger micros
go straight into 3 mm or 6 mm boxes together with their labels.   I
print locality details in 4-point type on sheets of labels which I then
cut up to a standard 20 x 10 mm size, so that all I have to write is the
identification details.

>I welcome learning from the list's experts and passing
>this information on to others.

**  I hope this is helpful;  I'm not an expert ....

>
>Thanks in advance,
>
>Phil Liff-Grieff
>
>
>=====
>Phil Liff-Grieff
>2447 Kemper Avenue
>La Crescenta, CA  91214
>(818) 541-1232
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