Alan Ansell

It is with great sadness that we must report the death of Alan Ansell on 17^th July 1999. Alan had been ill with cancer for several months but, despite draining treatment, had continued writing up his malacological researches. An obituary will be published in the next edition.

Liz Harper, Cambridge

Controlling Slugs Organically

The Centre for Alternative Technology, near Machynlleth in North Wales, includes a Tipsheet on its web site on how to control slugs in organic gardens. The comfrey method intrigued me -why does comfrey become ineffective from early July onwards?

http://www.cat.org.uk/information/tipsheets/slugs.html

Bill Bailey

Scottish Scallop Fishing Ban

The ban on scallop fishing off the west coast of Scotland has been extended to west of the Western Isles. The Government has found continuing high levels of Amnesic Shellfish Piosoning toxins in scallops. The toxin, domoic acid, is produced by blooms of algae on which the scallops feed.

Society's Original Logo Recovered

Reproduced below is the original drawing by Guy Wilkins that I believe formed the basis of the logo of the Malacological Society of London. [The original is 14.5 x 8.5 cm.] There is also a printer's 'proof' of the logo.

I found these in a ëcommon-placeí album of drawings and early photos assembled by Guy Wilkins. This album I rescued from a waste-paper basket in the Mollusca Section of the British Museum (Natural History) - as it was then called - in 1962, during my sojourn there for a year as a Research Associate, immediately after graduating. It had been thrown away as part of a clear-out the then Head of Section was pursuing. Having been told it was 'rubbish' I placed the album in my personal library where it still resides.

Since I have now retired from active malacology (at least for the time being!) I thought it was an appropriate moment to hand over this small part of The Society's history to The Society Archivist.

Charles Pettitt (former Keeper of Invertebrates at the Manchester Museum),

Bramhall, Cheshire. 21 March 1999

Bookstall Appeal

At the next Young Malacologists' Forum in November 1999, The Society would like to organise a bookstall with discounted current books and very reasonably priced. donated, scientific volumes. In order to make such a stall a success, The Society would be very grateful if members and friends would consider donating books and journals they no longer need for sale at this meeting.

If you are interested in donating your books, journals, reprints etc. or helping in any other way, please contact Alex Ball on 0207 942 5263 or email a.b...@nhm.ac.uk, or Elizabeth Platts on 01962 880396 for further information.

CLECOM - Checklist of the European Continental Mollusca.

The council of Unitas decided at the Vigo Congress in 1995 to initiate a checklist project, with a committee composed of the members of the Friedrich-Held-Gesellschaft working group established in Munich in 1989. A similar project operates for marine Mollusca (CLEMAM). The nomenclatural revisions will clear away accumulated debris of synonyms etc, and smooth the way to a stable computerised European checklist. The area covered by CLEMAM comprises all of geographical Europe together with the Caucasian states, Turkey, Cyprus and the Macaronesian archipelagoes. A first version for Section I (the faunistically well known states of northern, western and central Europe, including the Baltic states and France as a whole) will be available on the web in 1999.

The checklist will contain the names of species and subspecies considered valid, and synonyms, with reference to original descriptions and important revisions, and location of type specimens where known. Geographical information will be available by countries, enabling national lists to be compiled.

The members of the CLECOM committee are Ruud A Bank, Philippe Bouchet, Gerhard Falkner, Edmund Gittenberger, Bernhard Hausdorf, Ted von Proschwitz and Theo E J Ripken.

35 mm Slides Wanted

Does anyone know a good source for commercially available slides of invertrbrates (particularly molluscs and insects) in the UK? I am after material for teaching purposes, and have got the Marine Conservation Society sets, but drawn a blank beyond that. Any information very gratefully recieved by

Amanda Kear, BBC Natural History Unit, Whiteladies Road, Bristol BS8 2LR, UK. Email: Aman...@bbc.co.uk

Amanda Kear, Bristol