Carried by the Gulf Stream.

Horowhenua Chronicle, 5 August 1912, Page 4

Carried by the Gulf Stream.

A remarkable instance of the way that the most delicate of microscopic animals may be carried across an ocean was exhibited at a rocent meeting of the Linnean Society. Dr. John Martin sent two microscope slides for exhibition, both of polycistina shells, which bad been lonnd under unusual circumstances. "On December Ith. 1911," he said, "a few days after a stormy sea and heavy wind on the coast off Whitby. \ orkshire. I saw a little patch of beautiful iridescent colour floating on the surface of the then calm water. T skimmed this cloud of colour. and. on clearing later, find it | to be varieties of Bolycistina. of the family Rhizopoda. hut having siliceous instead of caloareous shells. These shells, which are of magnificent ferns, are identical with those usually found in tho West Indies, and along the coasts of Florida and the Gulf of Mexico. 1 believe they arc tho first discovered on the English coast, to which they will most prbablv have been brought by the Gulf Stream. Up to the present T have failed to find similar ones in any private or public collection which have been found locally. They are all purely West Tndian varieties, and appear to be absolutely new on these shores. ■' Professor 'Dondy remarked upon the. interest of this exhibition. and that the forms shown were similar to those procurable from Barbaras.