Scott asked:
 
>As long as there is nothing goin' on, I gotta question for anyone. I was
>watching the news, and somewhere near Clearwater Beach Florida, they were
>restoring the beach by pumping sand back on it. My question is: How deep or
>far out do they pump the sand from? Has anyone ever walked the areas of these
>activities and found any shells pumped onto the beach from this?
 
Yes, Scott, that is a bonanza for local collectors when beaches are
"renourished."  All sorts of goodies, both dead and alive, and fossil or
subfossil as well, pop out of that big tube. Which brings us to the point
that such projects are very injurious to the marine environments from which
the sand is pumped.  Beaches come and go with wind and storms and tides,
and renourishment projects seem to me to be a very harmful way of trying to
fool Mother Nature.
 
What is really amazing to me is that, time and again, the same communities
that set up ban-the shell-collectors movements will, in the same breath,
advance plans for renourishing their local beaches.
 
And for Maurizio, who's keen on olives and all the rest of you
olivophiles,:  Have you seen the new number of Apex (Publication of the
Societe Belge de Malacologie)?   Tursch, Greifeneder and Huart continue
their series, "Studies on Olividae" with number 28, "A puzzle of highly
multiform species: Oliva fulgurator (Roding, 1798) and related American
taxa."
 
Abstract:
The taxonomic status of the members of the Western Atlantic "Oliva
fulgurator - reticularis complex<" the Eastern Pacific "Oliva spicata
complex" and some related taxa is reviewed. O foxi Stingley, 1984, O.
fulgurator (Roding, 1798), O. polpasta Duclos, 1833, O.  scripta Lamarck,
1811 and O. spicata (Roding, 1798) are shown to be distinct species. O
spicata deynzerae Petuch & Sargent, 1986 [for our own Bev Deynzer] is a
distinct subspecies. The available type material of many synonymous taxa
has been studied and illustrated."
 
The study is copiously and very helpfully illustrated with characteristic
patterns, spires, and type material.
 
Lynn Scheu