Historia
Naturalis Teredinis sen xylophagi marini tubulo-conchoidis speciatim Belgici
by Gottfried Sellius, 1733
This treatise on shipworms was written when ships carried most trade and all ships were made of wood and thus provided fodder for the predations of shipworms. These creatures are not actually worms, they are mollusks, with a tiny shell attached to one end of a long, worm-like body. The pointed shell is used for burrowing into wood and can drill at about 8 to 12 rasping motions a minute, creating in soft wood a 4 inch tunnel in a month. Today estimates of shipworm damage to docks and ships throughout the world range from $200 million to $1 billion.
Although not directly
related to the Blaschkas and their work, this volume and others in the
case illustrate the varied economic, biological and aesthetic aspects
of marine invertebrates that have kept humans interested in them through
the centuries.
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Mann Library, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853 |
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