Dear Pete;-
  I like your explanation---and several of the others. The perk is there because it's there. "Now shut up and think of some other question!"
   Pride! My son is the producer/director of Gilligan's Island: The Musical. The writer is coming to see it this weekend. Pride!
   Next year, he is going to do The Tempest and has promised that I can try out for Caliban.
    Art
>
> From: Peter Egerton <[log in to unmask]>
> Date: 2004/02/20 Fri PM 07:30:27 EST
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Re: Perks
>
> Art et al,
>
> Rather than asking why Conus (and others with tiny opercula) has an
> operculum, ask what reason it might have to NOT have one. What selection
> force might cause them to loose it? Obviously there is no great force
> acting in that manner, since so many snails have vestigial opercula. It's
> still there because there's it's not lowering the animal's fitness (ability
> to produce young), but no longer large because having one doesn't increase
> the animal's fitness either.
>
> How about that for a possible answer.
>
> Regards,
> Peter
>
>
>
>
> At 02:09 PM 19/02/2004, you wrote:
> >>     I have a Conus literatus. It is about nine inches tall. So is
> >>its opening. It has a perk. The perk is about one inch. The question
> >>is: what the hecky darn good does such a small perk do?
> >
> >Decoration, of course!
> >
> >Seriously, I expect the operc is retained despite its apparent
> >obsolescence due to inertia. I wonder how large the opercs of Eocene
> >Conus were? Perhaps then they sealed the aperture?
> >
> >Well, why do some Sinum still have a small operc?
> >--
> >Andrew Grebneff
> >Dunedin, New Zealand
> >64 (3) 473-8863
> ><[log in to unmask]>
> >Fossil preparator
> >Seashell, Macintosh & VW/Toyota van nut
> >________________________________
> >I want your sinistral gastropods!
> >________________________________
> >Opinions in this e-mail are my own, not those of my institution
> >_______________________________________________
> >A: Because it reverses the logical flow of conversation.
> >Q: Why is top posting frowned upon?
>
> --
> Peter Egerton, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
> - - - - - - - Seashells and Web Publishing - - - - - - - - - -
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> Email: mailto:[log in to unmask]
>
>

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