Dear All,

I see the limitations of taking any shells when scubadiving in the
Bahamas. So, apart from Redfern (2001) which is (was) a splendid
start, no more to do there.

Today we live in a world where conservation is more a limitation to
knowledge than anything else. Biodiversity is especially rich in the
below 15 mm animals, even more rich in the below 10 mm animals. I can
fully understand that a dive buss wants to protect it's area, but
usually amateur divers touch only a  few spots, most often the nice
ones, not the interesting ones,  so it is not a problem to forbid
picking up something in these few square meters.

But completely forbid to take things from the bottom in areas which
are seldom dived is ridiculous. There are a hundred times more
biologists working in "protecting things" (which they don't know of,
as much is not described yet), than in taxonomy and nomenclature (too
difficult). The term "biodiversity" is used to give jobs protecting a
little known biodiversity as yet.

I was judge recently on Celebrate the Sea 2007 (Manila). It became
clear that apart from a shark, a dolphin, a seal and a whale, for the
protectors of nature the rest of the marine life does not exist. It
was especially sad to hear one of the world's prime photographers
call an Ovulid a Cowry.

My feeling is that by cutting off financial resources to museums and
taxonomic research, and at the same time forbidding amateurs to do
the job of discovering and describing things (of which they did 80 %
in many branches of zoology in the past), humanity shuts down it's
own eyes on what it will destroy anyway in the next 200 years. "What
we do not know does not hurt".

Professionals, and a wrongly informed world population, by promoting
the "useful" molecule, in the hope to obtain some finances, have cut
down their own freedom of easy transport of animals throughout the
planet. Now they cut down their resources once more by pseudo-
conservation.

Guido

----------------------------------------------------------------------
[log in to unmask] - a forum for informal discussions on molluscs
To leave this list, click on the following web link:
http://listserv.uga.edu/cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=conch-l&A=1
Type your email address and name in the appropriate box and
click leave the list.
----------------------------------------------------------------------