Shell Collection

What's the best way of spending a rainy morning? Dusting off your shell collection of course! And that's exactly what Fiona MacGillivray and I did on Friday morning. It was great fun, taking out each specimen and having Fiona confirm (or otherwise!) my somewhat dubious ID of 15 years ago. It's really reignited my interest in this less popular area of natural history. Here are two of my favourite species: the Faroe Sunset Shell (Gari fervensis) (left) and Hungarian Cap Shell (Capulus ungaricus) (right). Both species can be found on Islay. I love the names; the Sunset shell is like rays of a beautiful sunset and the Hungarian cap shell presumably resembles headwear in Hungary!

Becky