rare shell on dorset beach

[neptune]

i am an amateur but i recently collected some shells on a beach in dorset, england. most were the usual types of shell you would find - queen scallops, cockles, razor shells, an otter shell - but then i came across something very strange: vexillum plicarium. (i matched the shell with an image and descrïption in philip's guide to seashells and cross referenced it with images from the web.)

is it possible that a shell found mostly in the south-west pacific and east indian ocean could turn up on a dorset beach?

[paul monfils]

Anything is possible.  On at least three different occasions people have posted shells on this forum collected in Florida, that turned out to be Indo-Pacific species.  As I recall, one was a Cypraea clandestina, another a Bursa echinata, and I don't recall the other one. I have found a Cypraea caputserpentis and a Babylonia spirata with a hermit crab in it, on Cape Cod, Massachusetts.  Both these areas are tourist areas with many gift shops that sell baskets of assorted shells (which many tourists probably assume were collected locally), so no great surprise that some youngster may have dropped one on the beach, or simply discarded those in the basket that they didn't care for.  I don't know if the area you mentioned has such tourist shops, but Vexillum plicarium is one of those abundant species likely to turn up in such commercial bulk shell assortments.  <span class="petit">--Last edited by Paul Monfils on 2010-07-28 20:19:24 --</span>

[dave r]

Dorset has many shops like those you mention Paul, your explanation is the most likely. This is not the first instance of foreign shells turning up on British beaches I have heard of, a friend of mine showed me a shell he found in the South of England many years ago, it turned out to be a Gold-ring Cowry!
Dave

[paul monfils]

Dave,  Your comments reminded me of a story I read somewhere, and I managed to locate it without too much difficulty, in Abbott's classic book, Kingdom of the Seashell.  It is part of a piece on the use of cowrie shells for money.  Apparently tons of them were imported into England, for use in trading with some African countries. The part I recalled, which is germane to the present discussion, is this:

"Cowries were being imported into England as late as 1873.  In that year, a four-masted bark, the Glendowra, homeward bound from Manila with a cargo of 600 bags of money cowries, went aground in the fog near Seascale, along the coast of Cumberland. For many years these shells could be picked up in good condition on the English beaches."

[dave r]

Paul, yes I know this story well, it is well documented. They were still turning up 50 years later apparently!

[pilsbryi]

Dorset has many shops like those you mention Paul, your explanation is the most likely. This is not the first instance of foreign shells turning up on British beaches I have heard of, a friend of mine showed me a shell he found in the South of England many years ago, it turned out to be a Gold-ring Cowry!
Dave