F.A.Q.

We have reserved this space, divided in paragraphs to make easier the consultation, for all your frequent questions.

So you'll find questions (and replies) that, in your personal opinion, will seem you stupid or intelligent, but we believe equally important for to be here included.

Therefore let's help us to increase this list with the most dissimilar or unimaginable questions that your mind may beget, sending them by e-mail. If we'll consider them such important as to be a real F.A.Q., we'll include them here in succession, and if you don't find the answer to your question you can contact us

redazione@larcadinoe.com.

QUESTIONS ABOUT SALE

Is it possible the cash on delivery by Post?

-No. Owing to previous experiences, to warrant a better service we prefer to avoid this modality and not increase postage with further taxes. Besides the cash on delivery however don't assure the real receipt of the ordered articles.

Why I do point out my payment to you? Mayn't you to verify it?

-You aren't obliged to do it. It comes in handy to speed up the delivery of goods and to avoid every possible miscarriage like credits of equal amount by distinct customers which names sometimes aren't immediately verifiable. So, in your interest too, it's precious and welcome every your collaboration about this.

QUESTIONS ABOUT INSECTS

Are indeed real the dried insects that you sell?

-Yes, insects, like as fossils, stuffed animals and everything you'll find in the catalogues, are just real, mounted and dried (except obviously the alive insects of Breeding Catalogue!)

What is the difference between the insects to mount and those already mounted?

-Both are dried, that is no more soft and flexible as when they're living, but stiff and fragile to push and to press, light and friable like dried leaves. We sell all the insects of the catalogue papered or in coverings for practicalness (so packed they don't run the risk of breackages during the carriage) and for collectors' requirements that prefer to prepare the insects themselves. Therefore the specimen are folded on themselves, with legs and antennae curled up or, in the case of butterflies, with the wings closed one on the other. In this state, without softening them, they'd shatter if someone tries to spread to give them a natural posture. To do it, are necessary some preliminary techniques and a following preparation labour. In our website (Articles and Columns section) it's available a short guide about the main techniques to learn how to mount yourselves the dry insects. Once mounted and set in a natural posture (as they appear in almost all the photos of the catalogue) it's possible to preserve them in the same way of the museum into special display boxes (or entomological boxes), frames or various containers (see the section Equipment).

May the dead insects cause any diseases?

-Dried insects that we sell don't cause any diseases, not even those tropical. They have treated with acetone or freezing at departure or at arrival. Besides they are dried for a long time, and also to soften them, you'll not wake any drowsy virus or bacterium, don't worry!

Any insects like Eupatorus gracilicornis are painted?

-No. The sheen of their bodies, that looks like plastic material, is quite natural, with the contribution of an organic molecule typical of Arthropoda called chitin.

Do you feel sorry for those poor little beasts?

-Surely we feel sorry for them, but those who point out it, should feel accordingly pity for the skinned lambs streaming blood from the butcher's hooks, to finish as many pretty beefsteaks on our tables, or the furs weared by many vain ladies, the plushes made with coats of dogs and cats living skinned, the animal at the risk of extinction in the sight of the hunters and the pyromaniacs, and the tons of sea organisms in the fishing-nets.Do you feel sorry for the mosquitos that you crush?

They sting to survive and to lay their eggs! And what about the bugs that you crush under foot only because you're disgusted by them? There are also the snails and the lobsters living boiled, the rhinoceros killed because an idiot said that their horns are aphrodisiac, the cavies vividissected in the laboratories for silly cosmetic aims... We could extend this list through thousands of lines, to discovery that we kill not only to feed.

QUESTIONS ABOUT BREEDING

Are dangerous the alive Invertebrates that you sell?

-No, spiders excepted. In fact all the spiders, excluded Uloboridae family, have a venomous bite... some more, some less. Also if are very few the specimen really dangerous for men, the reaction at the poison is subjective and so they must be behaved with the utmost attention, therefore we take the liberty of discouraging you the breeding from the children, or alternatively under the supervision of an adult. As regard the other specimen that we sell, there aren't problems of danger. It's possible that a cricket can bite your finger, or that a leaf-insect can sting you with their thorns, but for these events, quite innocuous (to be scratched in the face by a cat or to be bitten by a dog is very much dangerous!), we inform you in the breeding cards with the "directions" of your new little friend.

Are all easy to breed?

-Yes, we have already selected all these specimen, above all those tropical, that don't adjust themselves to our climate or that however have some problems, like difficulties of coupling or of eggs hatching, high mortality in the juvenile or larval phase, food with difficulty to find, and so on.

QUESTIONS ABOUT SHELLS

The orange, yellow, violet and red colours of Pecten nobilis (or Chlamys senatoria) are natural or is it painted?

-It isn't painted. It is a matter of polimorfism in the specimen, that is the variability between organisms inside of popolations of a same specimen, as well as exist persons high or low, black or white, fair or brown.

QUESTIONS ABOUT FOSSILS

Are the fossils that you sell original or close copies?

-They are authentic fossils, that is "close copies" by molecular replacement that mother nature had produced for us many millions of years ago. If they're real close copies (because the original fossils, as for example the dinosaur's bones, have prohibitive costs), the information will be specified clear in the catalogue.

Why any fossils half one thousand millions years old, like some your Trilobites or Ortoceratides, are so cheap?

-If we must consider the value of fossils that we deal only on the ground of their antiquity, than only the sheiks could afford to buy the Trilobites and the Nautiloides. In reality in the seas of the Paleozoic Era these animals had a such evolutive explosion and they lived so long before their extinction, that they left entire fossil deposits, though the fossilization is a very rare event. Therefore quantity is the parameter that determines the value and so the price.

Why the teeth of the modern sharks are more expensive than the fossil shark's teeth? The fossils haven't more value?

-It's right leaving out the human factor: we have almost caused the extinction of the modern sharks massacring them pitilessly, though they really never threatens us. On the contrary, the ancient sharks neither had adversary nor natural plunderers. They prospered and multiplied undisturbed through millions of years. Today we find entire fossil deposits of teeth of these enormous sharks, and in consequence of this the price is cheap.

QUESTIONS ABOUT MINERALS

Do agate really become embittered in so many shades in the natural state? And how is it possible that it's as smooth as glass?

-It's true that agate exists in many shades, owing to the various impurities included into the mineral (SiO2); but it's also true than men love to retouch the beauties of nature giving agate more bright colours with artificial processes, after that cutting and dressing it into slices, paper-weights, etc.

Do really the stones used in the crystallotherapy have curative and spiritual powers?

-It's a difficult question to answer. Certainly a scientist should break into a hearty laugh hearing to take into consideration such possibility without foundation between the physics laws. Yet there are many, many people who believe in theology, in astrology, in cartomancy, in premonitions and other analogous phenomena. We don't want to tell you if "L'Arca di Noè" believes so; we say only that from age to age the crystallotherapy has been used like alternative medicine, and now during this New Age it's coming into fashion. For more detailed informations, see you our section "Articles and Surveies".

QUESTIONS ABOUT OTHER ANIMALS

Are the red and blue starfish really so made, or they are painted?

-Both. When they are living, the natural colour of each specimen in our catalogue is a fine bright red or a dark blue, but all the starfish, on their death, lose their pigments becoming of pale colour. According to the process of desiccation, they can or not retain their original colour. Those blue, indeed, are natural, while those red have been "recharged", that is they got again artificially their colours when alive.

May we buy any alive fish or starfish for aquarium?

-Certainly... but not sailing on "L'Arca di Noè"! Our paragraph "Other animals" deals with only mounted animals, (dried or prepared, as they say), and the only living animals that we have, all invertebrates, you can find them at the voice "Breeding". There are many websites about aquarium, good research!

QUESTIONS ABOUT TAXIDERMY

Do you sell also protected or in danger of extinction animals?

-Not at all! It's forbidden by the law; besides we have a coscience that prevents us from doing. Therefore you'll find only animals that, until the hunting is allowed and according to the rules, they'll continue to finish on our dinner tables or in the tassidermic laboratories. However, as regards the appearing exceptions in the catalogue, all the species illustred have been reported and in right with the laws in force.

Are you interested in buying my private collection of stuffed animals that I inherited from my grandfather?
 Thank you for the offer, but we are compelled to reject it, mainly because of lack of market. We get it constantly offers collections of individuals who would like to get rid of them, sometimes without even being regularly reported in the CITES list, but almost never required to purchase, and therefore do not treat them the most, going with what we are exhausted or there colleagues propose that we trust and knowledge of current legislation.


QUESTIONS ABOUT GADGETS

Are real the animals and the flowers contained in your resine keyholders?

-Yes.

QUESTIONS ABOUT EQUIPMENT

Which advices can you give with regard to any insects to put into a display box?

-The procedures of preparation of the Arthropods assure their intact preservation in the course of the time (nowadays is still possible to admire in the museums entomological collections from the last century). The fundamental shrewdness, over all if you haven't an airtigh entomological box, is to insert in a nook a piece of camphor (to replace when it's consumed) or another substance to drive the moths away from your collection.

QUESTIONS ABOUT CURIOSITY

Who is Tippy, a rubbit that you've mounted?

-By no means! Tippy is a member of the family in every respect, and though it does a lot of damages at home (it eats the wall-paper and it scatters "biological souvenir" in plenty - let's never buy a rubbit no dwarf if you haven't a garden!) we love him, as you can see in the photo: it eats as a little pig!

OTHER QUESTIONS

It's possible to call you to make a particular request?

- Our website operates only by e-mail, satisfing in this way all the questions and the exchanges of goods and opinions. We'll try to answer to everybody, but, as many people write us and the time is never enough, before sending us an e-mail, we pray you to read with great care the texts and the guides of all the sections, and expecially the terms of sale: perhaps here there're all the answers that you're looking for! For other information our mail is: redazione@larcadinoe.com.

I'd like come to see you: what's your address?

-Our address is: www.larcadinoe.com, so you can visit us when you like, without walking a long way, simply virtually sailing on our ark: we are open at any time, Sunday included. In the latter case you may occasionally find the purchasing function out of order to avoid unnecessary accumulation of orders that we could not process (we also rest from time to time).

If you have opportunity to visit Rome our address (only by appointment) is via Renzo Rossi, 22 - 00157 ROMA ITALY.