A moment that took me back to 1980's

Several fishing boats at Teluk Kumbar, a fishing village that well known with its 'prawn noodles'

I'm at my hometown, Penang, right now. Just arrived from Terengganu yesterday afternoon. Felt happy to see my children shook hands and kissed their grandparents. The tradition of respect the olders is still goes on, thanks God.

Yesterday evening, my father, a fisherman, told me that there were a lot of people at the beach trying their luck to search for the seashells. I then went to the beach with my brother and took several photos. When I was at the beach, I recalled back what I had done there years ago, around 1980's and early 1990'a (before I continue my study at University Putra Malaysia 1n 1992. Yes, I did the same with what the people did at the beach, searching for 'kepah', 'gayam', 'remis', 'barai', 'lala', 'kerang' and several others seashells. I still remember the tools that being used in order to find the seashells in the sand - broken woks, rakes, sievers, hoes or coconut shells.


Some of the seashells that being caught by a lady (the palm is mine,).



The other memory then comes again. When I was in the University, as a Diploma of Fisheries student, I had to take the 'Fundamental Biology' paper, and part of the syllibus of this paper was about living fossils. I'm shocked to see that two of the living fossils could be found here, at the beach where I am standing. What are they? They are 'belangkas' or horseshore crabs, the arthropoda and the 'barai' which we here taught it is a kind of seashells but actually not. It is actually fall under class Lingulata (Phylum Brachiopoda). I asked the lady about the 'barai' either they still could be found now, she said that she can't found it since years ago. Are the 'barai' extinct already? Hope this living fossil is still there.

I'll discuss a little bit about the animals mentioned above below.

'Barai' = Lingula sp.
Lingula is a genus of brachiopods within the class Lingulata. Lingula is among the few brachiopods surviving today but also known from fossils over 50 million years old.

Lingula sp. (Barai) - source:einstein.freeblog.hu/ page/2/)

Scientific classification
Kingdom : Animalia
Phylum : Brachiopoda
Class : Lingulata
Order : Lingulida
Family : Lingulidae
Genus : Lingula

Species : L. adamsi
L. anatina
L. dregeri
L. eocenica
L. parva
L. reevii
L. rostrum
L. tenuis
L. translucida
L. tumidula
L. waikatoensis



Belangkas = Horseshoe crab

Despite its name, it is more closely related to spiders, ticks, and scorpions than to crabs.

Scientific classification
Kingdom : Animalia
Phylum : Arthropoda
Subphylum : Chelicerata
Class : Merostomata
Order : Xiphosura
Family : Limulidae
Genus : Limulus
Species : L. polyphemus

Binomial name
Limulus polyphemus
Linnaeus, 1758