Mike, I must agree with your assessment of the situation in South Florida, both coasts. Ive visited the area every few years since the 1950's and the beaches have changed a bit. Where there used to be a diverse population of mollucks, arthropods and small fish to be seen in the shallow water, one finds very little on the renourished beaches. Those beaches could be repopulated quickly if the adjoining beaches haven't been re-nourished recently. Since that is rarely the case, I've found less and less to interest me or the children I see beachcombing. In the Venice area, I wonder how the renourishment has affected the numbers of fossil sharks teeth, a local claim to fame, found there. I saw that the sand was being collected a mile or two offshore and I looked along the beach where it was being deposited but I found little fossil material. It seems that even the populations dead animals are being impacted.
-----Original Message-----
From: Conchologists List [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of mike gray
Sent: Saturday, January 14, 2006 10:20 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Effects of collecting shells from beaches, and changes in the numbers of shells on beaches
Rosemary Payne wrote:
> Does anyone have any information on this? I'd really appreciate it.
>
> I was in Thailand in December, collecting shells on a beach, and was challenged by another visitor who felt that shells should not be collected but should be left for others to enjoy. I said that I thought that for most active beaches - which this one is - collecting in moderation probably had little effect on the shells available to others the next day because shells are continually arriving and being broken up. This was met with disbelief; as I didn't know of any research that had set out to tackle the question, I had a first try by collecting 5 taxa systematically from the hight-tide line and the upper intertidal zone of the same beach every morning for the three weeks that I was there.
>
I wouldn't worry much about collecting rollers. They won't last long, especially on a tourist beach with traffic, sun, and the mechanical beach cleaners found everywhere these days.
Locally (SoFla), we are more concerned about the dredgers destroying millions of live mollusks including the protected S.
gigas, in the name of "beach renourishment".
m
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