I’m pleased to see so many field meeting reports in this issue of Mollusc World. This exchange of information is important in raising the profile of, and interest in molluscs as well as being of interest to the society’s membership. Which raises the question - are we doing enough to promote the importance of molluscs to the general public?
There has been debate recently on the justification of spending large sums of public money on species such as Vertigo or Margaritifera. Indeed, I was asked this week, “what is the point of Vertigo moulinsiana - what does it do?” Good question - its easy enough to trot out all the usual stuff about how its a good indicator species of the health of a wetland and how it has its part in ecosystem functioning. However, does this actually mean anything to the general public. After all what fraction of a percentage of the population is ever going to see a Vertigo or a pearl mussel for that matter. Try as we may there is always going to be a giant leap of getting over the perception of “ugh, slimy creatures that eat my lettuces”.
A very interesting publication is Stephen Kellert’s ‘The Value of Life’ in which he explores the attitudes of man towards animals and nature. The most important for the general populations of western cultures are strongly humanistic and moralistically influenced. Therefore as a scientific community we should also consider such aspects into argumentation in addition to the scientific and ecological arguments for securing mollusc biodiversity and conservation.