This may be a "BIG" year for our local population of glass bubble shells,
Haminoea solitaria. Every few years they appear in big numbers at the end
of summer and early fall, washing up in huge numbers and eventually showing
up live all over the mud in the shallows. Then they will be mostly absent
for a few years. Some references discuss a "giant" form called insculpta
Totten, reaching 18-20mm, though of no taxonomic significance. In the
years  when they boom, I can find a few in the 17-18mm  range out of many
hundreds of smaller ones. presumably at the far size end of the bell
curve.  This year is looking different. They are starting to show up in
drift in very small numbers, but about every 2nd or 3rd one is in the 18-
20mm+ range so far, so perhaps these are the "insculpta" of earlier
authors? Has anybody ever found these in that size range? In some 35 years
of visiting the same site, this is the first time I noticed any that big.

Steve

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