Yep, Charonia variegata, Charonia tritonis, Charonia lampas, Pinna nobilis,
Cypraea esontropia etc etc. Check out cites on the internet. And ofcourse no
coral!!!!!! Dennis.
At 20:59 7-12-99 +1300, you wrote:
>I was interested to read some of your messages regarding the CITES laws
about taking this shell. I had a rather unpleasant experience earlier in the
year when I made my first shell purchase over the internet. Having not yet
found this wonderful newsgroup full of information and advice, I was quite
naive. I ordered some shells from Shell Horizons, Florida. They seemed very
reasonably priced and their website showed beautiful examples. Being a
beginner I still need a lot of the common shells. I ordered, among others, 2
Stombus Gigas. At the time I had no idea it was an endangered species, and
there was no mention of this on the website. In fact, they proudly display
in bold letters: " we do not trade in endangered species". I emailed them
several times before placing my order to check things out, and I asked
whether a permit was required to export the shells to NZ. I was told no.
>When the shipment arrived it was duly inspected by NZ Customs and our
Conservation Dept. They identified the Queen Conch shells and siezed them. I
received the remainder of the shells with a very strong letter from Customs
berating me for ordering these shells and informing me they would be destoyed.
>I was very upset and concerned, so I phoned the Conservation Dept and
Customs and spoke to several people about it. I explained that I had no idea
it was on the endangered list, and showed them records of emails received
from Shell Horizons, etc. They said the shipment should have come with a
CITES permit, but eventually agreed that if I could get a belated CITES
permit from the seller, they would consider it. Back I went to Shell
Horizons to tell them exactly what I thought of the whole thing, and I
wasn't happy with the quality of the shells I received either. Nearly all of
them were badly chipped, cracked or dead and dull.
>The guy I dealt with was really rude, saying the shells were "good" quality
according to him and anyway what do you expect for that price..., and that
NZ Customs were just a bunch of trouble-making fanatics. He was not at all
interested in getting me a permit, he insisted that a permit was only
required for commercial shipments of a dozen or more. He informed me they
sell thousands of them all over the world without trouble. This is not legal
according to the authorities here. Anyhow, I finally got a refund for the 2
Strombus Gigas from Shell Horizons, with much grumbling from them.
>Anyway, that experience taught me some valuable lessons. It will be a while
before I even consider another purchase from overseas. In any case the
freight charge was nearly as much as the shells, which makes the exercise
pointless.
>This whole issue of Strombus Gigas being classified as endangered, yet
seems to be sold in huge quantities is a real worry. I sent an email to the
CITES office for the Florida area about it, but I never even received an
acknowledgement or reply. It would be quite nice to have a Strombus Gigas
for my collection, but I certainly do not want to contribute to the trade of
an endangered species. How would I be able to tell for sure when or where a
shell was taken - unscrupulous dealers are not going to admit to breaking
the law. I think I will just steer clear from this one - there are many
other beautiful shells out there that are plentiful.
>By the way - any other endangered shells I should be aware of??
>
>
>
>
><!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN">
><HTML><HEAD>
><META content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1" http-equiv=Content-Type>
><META content="MSHTML 5.00.2919.3800" name=GENERATOR>
><STYLE></STYLE>
></HEAD>
><BODY bgColor=#ffffff>
><DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>I was interested to read some of your messages
>regarding the CITES laws about taking this shell. I had a rather unpleasant
>experience earlier in the year when I made my first shell purchase over the
>internet. Having not yet found this wonderful newsgroup full of information
and
>advice, I was quite naive. I ordered some shells from Shell
>Horizons, Florida. They seemed very reasonably priced and their website
>showed beautiful examples. Being a beginner I still need a lot of the common
>shells. I ordered, among others, 2 Stombus Gigas. At the time I had no
idea
>it was an endangered species, and there was no mention of this on the website.
>In fact, they proudly display in bold letters: " we do not trade in endangered
>species". I emailed them several times before placing my order to
>check things out, and I asked whether a permit was required to export the
>shells to NZ. I was told no.</FONT></DIV>
><DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>When the shipment arrived it was duly
>inspected by NZ Customs and our Conservation Dept. They identified the Queen
>Conch shells and siezed them. I received the remainder of the shells with a
very
>strong letter from Customs berating me for ordering these shells and informing
>me they would be destoyed.</FONT></DIV>
><DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>I was very upset and concerned, so I phoned the
>Conservation Dept and Customs and spoke to several people about it. I
explained
>that I had no idea it was on the endangered list, and showed them records of
>emails received from Shell Horizons, etc. They said the shipment should have
>come with a CITES permit, but eventually agreed that if I could get a belated
>CITES permit from the seller, they would consider it. Back I went to Shell
>Horizons to tell them exactly what I thought of the whole thing, and I wasn't
>happy with the quality of the shells I received either. Nearly all of them
were
>badly chipped, cracked or dead and dull.</FONT></DIV>
><DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>The guy I dealt with was really rude, saying the
>shells were "good" quality according to him and anyway what do you expect for
>that price..., and that NZ Customs were just a bunch of trouble-making
fanatics.
>He was not at all interested in getting me a permit, he insisted that a permit
>was only required for commercial shipments of a dozen or more. He informed me
>they sell thousands of them all over the world without trouble. This is
>not legal according to the authorities here. Anyhow, I finally got a
refund
>for the 2 Strombus Gigas from Shell Horizons, with much grumbling from
>them.</FONT></DIV>
><DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Anyway, that experience taught me some valuable
>lessons. It will be a while before I even consider another purchase from
>overseas. In any case the freight charge was nearly as much as the shells,
which
>makes the exercise pointless.</FONT></DIV>
><DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>This whole issue of Strombus Gigas being
classified
>as endangered, yet seems to be sold in huge quantities is a real worry. I sent
>an email to the CITES office for the Florida area about it, but I never even
>received an acknowledgement or reply. It would be quite nice to have a
Strombus
>Gigas for my collection, but I certainly do not want to contribute to the
trade
>of an endangered species. How would I be able to tell for sure when or where a
>shell was taken - unscrupulous dealers are not going to admit to breaking the
>law. I think I will just steer clear from this one - there are many other
>beautiful shells out there that are plentiful.</FONT></DIV>
><DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>By the way - any other endangered shells I should
>be aware of??</FONT></DIV>
><DIV> </DIV>
><DIV> </DIV>
><DIV> </DIV>
><DIV> </DIV></BODY></HTML>
>
Dennis C.Nieweg
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