i had a similar experience several years ago - on my way in, i was
bringing shells for a friend from the us and elsewhere out of my
collection... he advised me to declare them going in, and indeed the
nice lady at customs looked at every single one. she took away some
bivalves because they still had some dried animal inside, then she
came back a short time later and gave them back to me, the insides now
thoroughly cleaned and glistening. out of some 300 people off the
plane, i was the last to clear customs. my friend laughed when he
picked me up and told me that was exactly what he expected. going out
i had no problems, as noted below.

On 8/14/12, JAVIER LOPEZ VICENTE VICENTE <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> I was in Australia 10 years ago. I asked in customs when I arrived and they
> advised me about Cypraeas and Volutas, but nothing special aboout other
> ones, except as Geoff says, in protected areas.
> Indeed I showed the shells in customs when I was leaving (more than 4
> kilos) and there were no problems.
> Some friends had some troubles because they didn't tell anything about
> their own shells when arriving (in a one day stop) and their shells were
> confiscated at departure.
>
> Regarding NZ, I can tell you that some landsnails are very protected, but
> nor problems with marine sps. (5 years ago)
>
> Best Regards
> Javier.
> Lanzarote
> Canary Islands, Spain
>
> On Tue, Aug 14, 2012 at 10:55 AM, Doug Stemke <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
>> Hello All.
>>
>> I am thinking about a sabbatical sometime in 2013/2014 to Australia and
>> possibly New Zealand. I would like to do some shell collecting while I am
>> there.  What kind of licenses are required, any kind of special export
>> documents needed?  If you have web sites with this kind of information it
>> would be greatly appreciated.  I am just starting to think about my trip
>> (at
>> this point I haven't even thought about what states I would visit) and
>> this
>> kind of information would be useful in thinking about my trip.
>>
>> Many thanks.
>>
>> Doug
>>
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