Dear Andrew,
Sorry to take so long to reply. We have been away on holiday.
Thanks for your recommendations regarding Powell's book. I contacted the
links you sent me, but no luck there. I guess I will just have to keep
looking.
It really is a great pity there is no recent book on identifying NZ shells.
I am just an amateur collector, but I'm very keen to photograph any and all
specimens I can find. My husband is a computer programmer, and I have been
thinking that together we could probably make a fairly decent reference
program which could be put onto CDRom. It would be quite a big project,
probably a couple of years, and I would have to refer to those far more
knowledgable than myself regarding data, but if I could find a few brains
who would help out, we could undertake to get the images and programming to
put it all together.
What do you think about this idea? Maybe there are too few collectors who
would use a computer program rather than a book. I guess if it did ever
eventuate it would not be too difficult to make a paper version if the
publishing costs were viable. I certainly don't know anything about that
side of things. Anyway, it's one of those ideas that grab me and won't let
go. I fully intend to amass my own collection of photos on computer in any
case.
Well, I must go now. Hoping all is well with you. Happy shelling.
Kindest regards, Barbara.