And more from the aquarium:
 
Within a few minutes of extinguishing the main aquarium
lights, once again signs of life began to appear.  Most of
the cowries, including Helmut Lynx, were distributed
around the water line at the top of the tank, and all the
cones except Mark Episcopatus were buried.  Mark was
still moving his siphon, but had moved little since he
was harpooned by Art, the conus textile.  Eduardo
Magnificus was the first to move, bursting from the rubble
at the bottom of the aquarium, and as might be expected,
headed straight up the wall to the spot where Helmut
was stationed.  He climbed fairly quickly at first, but as
he approached the cowry, he slowed until he was barely
moving.  I got my camera and waited to see what would
happen.
 
When Eduardo got within a few millimeters of Helmut, he
stopped.  He extended his siphon to with about a millimeter
of Helmet, and just sat there.  And sat.  Eduardo would
move his siphon to either side, back and forth, but never
made any attempt to harpoon the lynx.  For two hours I
sat there, camera in hand, waiting for one of the snails
to break the standoff.  Neither one had budged, when along
the water line came an unsuspecting cypraea caurica.
As it became obvious that the caurica intended to crawl
between Helmut and Eduardo, I thought, "OK, here's an
easy meal for Eduardo!"  As the caurica forced his way
between these two, Eduardo never retracted his siphon.
Instead, he simply "folded" it to one side, and allowed
the caurica to pass unmolested.  He never showed the
slightest interest in the caurica, and as soon as he was
out of the way, Eduardo resumed his stakeout on the
cypraea lynx.  For a total of three hours Eduardo kept
his vigil, then finally turned around and headed back to
the bottom of the tank.  He buried himself without any
further attempts at catching a meal, and I went to bed.
 
The next day Mark had still not moved, and his siphon
was no longer visible.  The third day after being stung
by Art I removed him from the tank, and sure enough,
he was dead.  It seemed amazing that he had survived
for over two days after the encounter with the textile
cone, only to eventually succumb to the toxin.  His
foot seemed to be paralyzed almost from the beginning,
yet he had crawled several inches and partially buried
himself just before he died.  It made me wonder just
how close he had come to surviving the encounter.
 
That afternoon, a good friend and outstanding photographer
asked if he could borrow Tom and Eduardo for a little
photo session in the ocean.  I said sure, so he took the
two cones on a field trip to Faga'alu, on the west side of
Pago Pago Harbor.  He managed to get photos of both
cones, as well as some other creatures that he had
planned to photograph, but unfortunately lost track of
Tom Episcopatus, and only came home with Eduardo.
I was happy to have Eduardo back, but when I put him
in the tank he immediately buried himself, and I didn't
see him again for five days.
 
Thus began a quiet period in the Cone War aquarium.
For several days and nights there was little action,
with all of the cones staying mostly buried, and the
cowries touring the rocks and glass with no worries.
I wondered if everyone had become accustomed to
the aquarium, and had now entered a period of more
typical activity since the novelty was gone.  I decided
to shake things up a bit, and after a few hours in the
water, returned with three new residents for the tank.
Meet Paul Textile, slightly smaller than Art, and the
Omaria brothers, Andy and Gary.
 
Each conus omaria had a scar on his dorsum, but I
decided it would be easy enough to tell them apart,
as one had a straight scar (Andy) and one had a
curved scar (Gary).  I put all three in the tank at the
same time, turned out the light, and waited for the
fireworks.  It took about five minutes for the three
cones to bury themselves, and none of them resur-
faced for the rest of the evening!  I guess the new
surroundings might not have been responsible for
all the previous week's activity after all.
 
I thought it over carefully, and decided that all of the
unsettled cowry activity might have been responsible
for the cones' excitement, so I determined that I would
collect a few more small cowries for the tank and see
if anyone became more motivated.  This time I went
out and caught two cypraea isabellas and four erosas,
and dropped them in the tank with the cones.  I didn't
notice much activity that evening, but in the morning
there was one empty isabella shell and one empty
erosa shell, so at least a couple of the cones had had
dinner during the night.
 
That evening I came in and extinguished the aquarium
light, and waited to see if any of the cones would chase
the remaining cowries.  Most of the cowries were lined
up near the water line at the top of the tank, though a
few were on the rocks or sitting on the gravel.  Helmut
had taken up residence in the clump of branch coral,
and had been there since the previous night.  A couple
of minutes after the light was turned off, Eduardo came
bursting from the rubble, and made straight for Helmut's
hideout.
 
Helmut appeared to be in a fairly safe place in the coral,
but this time he didn't wait until Eduardo was upon him
before he started his escape maneuvers.  When Eduardo
was still several inches away, Helmut seemed to sense
his coming, and left his hiding spot in the coral and began
climbing for higher ground.  He climbed to the highest
point on the coral branch, actually out onto the very tip
of one of the branches, and stopped there.  Eduardo
continued on to the place where Helmut had been, and
then actually stretched upward toward Helmut's new
perch,  with his siphon pointed directly at him.  Eduardo
knew the lynx cowry was up there, but he couldn't seem
to figure out how to get to him.  He pirouetted (slowly)
several times, keeping his siphon aimed directly at
Helmut, but never made any attempt to climb onto the
coral.  He eventually gave up and crawled away, and
Helmut remained perched on the tip of the coral branch
for the rest of the evening.  It turned out that this was
the last time Eduardo showed any particular interest
in Helmut, as he seemed to have decided that cypraea
isabella and erosa were now more to his liking (or at
least more suited to his hunting skills...).
 
(to be continued)
 
And the real cone wars begin soon...
 
Cheers,
 
 
 
Don