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.
00:51Asked them what they thought of it.
00:53And 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.
01:02So my question was, well, what's it doing at Lake George?
01:07I thought of three reasonable possibilities. One is that someone's dropped it here, maybe as a joke, but we're quite
01:16some distance from where you stop at the rest area, Aguirre's Gap.
01:21And it seems unlikely that someone would do that.
01:26But I do see pelicans on the lake and I do know they scoop up all sorts of stuff.
01:31They come in from the coast. We know that.
01:33Is it possible that this was scooped up by a pelican and then regurgitated here?
01:40That's a possibility.
01:41The other possibility is that maybe they live in the lake.
01:46And maybe because these shells start life as a larval stage that floats in water, that could easily be scooped
01:57up by almost any bird.
01:59Maybe that is the source. The birds came here, the larva got established and these things grew in the lake.
02:07I think that's less likely. I like the pelican story. I think the best of those options.
02:13So the most likely scenario is the pelican story, but until there's any evidence to show that that did happen,
02:19it's a bit of a mystery.
02:20Yeah, it is. Yeah, yeah. I'd like to see a pelican actually doing it for us.
02:24So we should keep walking along the lake's edge and see if we can see.
02:28You've found nothing else like this. This is the only one you've found here.
02:31It's the only one I've found. I keep my eyes open since I've found it.
02:34I am going to talk to as many locals as I can just on the off chance they've seen something.
02:41And you spend a lot of time by the shores of Lake George.
02:44And I notice stuff. When you keep coming back, I measure the water level here every couple of weeks and
02:51always look along the shoreline just to see what's there.
02:56Usually it's old bottles or, you know, rusty barbed wire or stuff like that, but this shell, well, what can
03:04I say?
03:04You guys look so good in a sense today.
03:04Goodbye, thank you.
03:04Goodbye,�ke.
03:05Goodbye, всем.
03:08Goodbye.
03:08Goodbye, loser, someday.
03:09Goodbye, I improve.
03:10Goodbye, guys, Doug.
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