Lamp Shells (Brachiopoda)
- Comments
-
Glasgow Museums has a collection of approximately 135 Brachiopoda specimens. These date from 1896 to 2007. This collection contains around 130 dried specimens and a further five specimens in spirit. The majority of the dried specimens come from three collections – Alfred Brown in 1896, David Robertson in 1902 and Thomas Gray in 1910, while the specimens in spirit were mostly collected by scuba divers in the 1980s from locations around Scotland. The Thomas Gray collection in particular contains species from all over the world, including New Zealand, Peru, Japan and the UK. There are also a few specimens from more recent collectors, including the 1990 Cohen collection of New Zealand invertebrates. Brachiopods, or lampshells, are an ancient phylum that consists mainly of extinct species. They are small sessile marine animals with two shells that look superficially like molluscan bivalves. They are found on the sea floor either attached to hard substratum or buried in soft sediments. There are around 350 species found worldwide.
- Broader term
- Staff Contact