REPORTS OF MEETINGS
285
I. Trans. Herts. nat. Hist. Soc, 20 : 133-140) were abundant, forming
green flocculent masses among the Spirogyra, and Hottonia.
Sunday, 10th May 1959
Joint meeting with the St. Osyth Bird Watching and Preservation
Society at St. Osyth. Thirty-three members of the Club joined the local
Society for this meeting in brilliant sunshine that was to last all day.
Our leaders, Miss Hollings and Mr. Mead, met the joint party and
explained the day's programme. The first party, led by Miss Hollings,
concentrated on the plants on the foreshore at Leewick. A second party
set off on a bird-watching tour of the shingle and shore at Colne Point,
and a third party visited the bird-trapping area at St. Osyth Boating
Lake. One of the finds of the first party was a slightly damaged speci-
men of the giant polychaete worm, Nereis virens Sars, known to anglers
as the Creeper and the King Rag. This worm reaches twelve to fifteen
inches in length (one of nearly 17 inches is recorded in the Plymouth
Fauna List) and more than an inch in breadth, and although part of
the posterior region is missing, the Leewick specimen is 13i inches in
length.
After a most enjoyable day in the sun, our hosts accompanied the
Club back to the King's Arms at St. Osyth for tea.
Saturday, 27th June 1959
This meeting, led by the President, was well attended and, with the
object of exploring the Naze and Stone Point, followed by a visit to
Skippers Island, offered much of interest for all members. The Naze
has been in the ownership of the Eagle family who have farmed it for
many years, and by the courtesy of the present owner the Club was
allowed access to the land. On the Naze and Stone Point, Dr. R. H.
Nisbet reports that he found the following creatures.
The serpulid worm, Pomatoceros triqueter, the calcareous tube of
which were plentiful on the larger stones; tests of the small sea urchin,
Psammechinus miliaris; sheets of a polyzoan, Membranipora sp. (not
living). Living specimens of the following:—A Tanaid (?Apseudes)
burrowing in large numbers in the mud banks at the Naze; the Edible
Winkle Littorina littorea, the Rough Winkle L. saxatilis, and the Flat
Winkle L. littoralis; and several groups of the Slipper Limpet, Crepidula
fornicata. The remaining molluscs were dead shells only. They included
the edible Whelk (Buccinum undatum) and also its empty egg capsules,
the common Top Shell (Gibbula cineraria), the Dog Whelk (Nucella
lapillus) and Nassarius reticulatus.
Bivalve shells included the Piddocks, Pholas dactylus, Barnea
candida, B. parva and Pholadidea loscoinbiana, all of which are thought
to be living in the compacted mud of the Naze; a Mactra Corallina and
Gryffia (Ostrea) virginica. Shells of the last-mentioned are derived
from an abortive attempt to cultivate the American oyster in the Essex
creeks and estuaries (Dr. H. A. Cole, Fisheries Laboratory, Lowestoft—
personal communication). Shells of Cardium edule, Venerupis pullastra
and Chlamys opercularis were found, together with the shells (cuttle
bones) of the Cuttlefish, Sepia officinalis.