00:00Over the years, many strange objects have been found here at Lake George, from lost dentures to discarded pianos.
00:08However, the most recent discovery made by Professor Brad Pillins of the ANU, well, it is truly remarkable.
00:16It has to take the cake.
00:18Well, I couldn't believe it, actually. I picked up this shell. It was sitting pretty much where we're standing now.
00:24And I thought, well, that's funny. I've never seen one of these before.
00:28Not around here, anyway. It reminded me more of shells you'd pick up on the beach.
00:34So I thought, well, maybe this species of shell is living in the lake.
00:38It was very fresh. You can see it's not weathered or anything. It hasn't been sitting around for months.
00:45So I sent a message to the Australian Museum in Sydney, asked them what they thought of it.
00:52And they sent a message back saying, oh, it's a very common marine shell, common up the east coast of
00:58Australia and further afield into conversation.
01:01So my question was, well, what's it doing at Lake George?
01:06I thought of three reasonable possibilities. One is that someone's dropped it here, maybe as a joke, but we're quite
01:15some distance from where you stop at the rest area, Aguirre's Gap.
01:21It seems unlikely that someone would do that. But I do see pelicans on the lake and I do know
01:28they scoop up all sorts of stuff.
01:30They come in from the coast. We know that. Is it possible that this was scooped up by a pelican
01:35and then regurgitated here?
01:38I think that's a possibility. The other possibility is that maybe they live in the lake and maybe because these
01:47shells start life as a larval stage that floats in water,
01:54that could easily be scooped up by almost any bird.
01:58Maybe that is the source. The birds came here, the lava got established and these things grew in the lake.
02:06I think that's less likely. I like the pelican story. I think the best of those options.
