Very interesting discussion on fakes.  I got two both on ebay a painted
Cypraea hirasei and a Pterynotus loebbecki.  The later, in truth, had
listed as 'enhanced' (I should have read the fine print, my fault on the
later).  Further I have begun to doubt data on several shells which upsets
me almost as much.

In the trade of fake natural history items hit me full force when I was
teaching down at Hanover College in southern Indiana.  The College was
trying to develop a nice natural history museum to compliment the new
science building.  A guy who has a business in a 'nearby Ohio city'
claimed that he purchased large amounts of natural history items in Russia
and would give the school some great breaks on material including mammoth
tusks and mammoth hair and lots of amber with natural history organisms
inclusing insects, other arthropods, mussles, even two lizards.  I bought
one myself.  I went on the internet and learned how rare actual lizard
amber was.  I placed my piece under UV light (which we use in the lab, I'm
a Molecular Biologist) and sure enough there was a telltail glow of
plastic.  I looked at the school's amber, all fake.  The guy took it back,
I still wonder if they managed to fake the mammoth material as well.
Anyway, a good lesson.  And yes, I kept my piece of fake amber.  For the
price it was a really good piece of work.

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