I have in my collection 23 species of mollusks 
plus 5 brachiopods originally dredged by the 
Blacks and obtained second- or 
third-hand.  However, this includes a Siratus 
thompsoni from French Guyana, so the Black 
reference there must be highly questionable.
Similarly, 11 species dredged by Jim Moore, including one fossil.
And 9 micro bivalves dredged by Ted Yocius.

John
Lancaster, PA

At 11:48 AM 10/09/14, you wrote:
>Sue,
>
>In the late 1960’s into the early 1970’s 
>several shrimpers dredged shell material in the 
>off season.  Jim Moore of the Sarasota area did 
>shallow water dredging on “live bottom” to 
>180’ in the Gulf, Ted Yocius dredged off St. 
>Augustine, but the deep water material was from 
>Donna and Riley Black in Fort Myers area. There 
>was also someone who did some small dredging in 
>the early 1970’s in the Keys but sold shells 
>in small lots and not in bushels, which is where 
>I got a Pterynotus phaneus (Dall 1889), which was a rare shell then.
>
>My parents (Jake and Ethel) made arrangements to 
>pick up a couple of bushels from the 
>Blacks.  The Blacks were very hospitable, 
>showing them a lot of shells but the Blacks told 
>them “the rare ones” were in a safe deposit 
>box.  Our family bought about five bushels over 
>the years.  The material from off Desoto Canyon 
>in 100 fathoms was remarkably similar in all the 
>bushels.  Shells were in a dry, but somewhat 
>musty smell I remember to this day of the ocean, 
>consisting of gray broken shell rubble and light gray sand.
>
>By some coincidence (?) a Stenorhytis pernobilis 
>Fischer & Bernardi, 1857 was often found in the 
>middle of the bushels a few inches down from the 
>top, never more than one in varying conditions 
>from old gray ones with chipped spines to one 
>with an operculum. The predominate shells were 
>the Murex beaui (Fischer & Bernardi, 1857), many 
>with operculum but none with the super-flaring 
>webbed varicies.  The other very common shells 
>were the  Aequipecten glyptus (Verrill, 1882) 
>entire and of different sizes, and the Scaphella 
>which was always very dead and never could get a 
>good one.  Also there were a lot of the deep 
>water Xeonophra Tugurium caribaeum (Petit, 
>1856).  The large Dentalium, Conus villepini 
>Fischer and Bernardi, 1857 were there in some 
>numbers.  Rarer were, Conus mazei Deshayes,1874, 
>Poirieri pazi (Crosse, 1869), Pteropurpura 
>bequaerti (Clench & Farfante, 1945) and Murex 
>hidalgo Crosse,1869. Also a medium sized turrid, 
>but curiously there were no really small or micro shells that I remember.
>
>Since this was such a rare treat to look for 
>deep water shells, we would save the grunge and 
>go through the material over and over.  This is 
>just what quickly comes to mind of an event 45 
>years ago with no attempt to update current 
>nomenclature.  It would be so much fun if 
>economic conditions allowed shrimpers again to 
>dredge deep water shells to sell by the bushel.
>
>
>
>Alan Gettleman
>
>Merritt Island, FL


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