live angel wing at lh beach

I found this ANGEL WING pair the same day I found those cute little RAGGED SEA HARES in my last post but I kinda got distracted in showing this cool find for a few days. Things have been a little crazy here in on the west coast of Florida since Tropical Storm Isaac has been trying to make his mind up if we were going to be his target or not. It doesnt look like a direct hit for us, so before I get distracted again, I’ve got to show you what happened with this cool juvenile ANGEL WING!

angel wing pair

As soon as I saw this double ANGEL WING on the beach, I got out my video camera and started filming since it isn’t often that you find the pair together laying on the beach. It seemed so weird to me…. and it got weirder when I saw that the body of the MOLLUSK was still inside the shell. So walk along with me while we watch what happens to this “shell” …

He was alive! It’s that so cool he survived?

angel wing tip out of sand

Remember when I said I thought he lost his MESOPLAX(which I probably mispronounced the word but hey, I was happy that I remembered the dang thing ;))? That is the little plate or cross bar that is attached to both valves when the animal is still alive. I thought that was gone when I didn’t think he was alive. I quickly put on my cheater readers (thank goodness I had them with me!) and saw that the MESOPLAX was still in place. To show you what it looks like, here’s a photo of an ANGEL WING pair with its MESOPLAX that MurexKen and MurexAlice found and I posted in Angels On The Gulf Coast.

Angel Wing shell pair

 As I write this post in my home on Sanibel Island, it is rainy, dark and dreary with scattered wind gusts effecting us already from Tropical Storm Isaac which is just starting to hit the western part of the Florida Keys. The storm track has now moved further to the west so we are not in “the cone” as we were yesterday and early this morning. We are far enough away from the storm now that we don’t have any evacuation warnings. Oh. Thank. Goodness. We don’t have to evacuate but we were prepared to leave and would have left in a heartbeat if we were still on track for a hurricane. We don’t mess with Mother Nature. Now our thoughts are with the folks that are in the new path and wishing safety for everyone. Please be safe!

Tropical Storm isaac 7

So now that they are only predicting tropical force winds here similar to what we experienced with Tropical Storm Debbie in June, I expect to see shells rolling in but not until a couple of days. Right now the shells are being taken out with the east winds so there is nothing really on our beaches at this point. The storm should pass us tomorrow afternoon but it may bring storm surge flooding which can be very dangerous so we always have to consider safety first. It should take a couple of days any way for the shells to arrive since they have been pushed out with the eastern winds so they have to have time to get pushed back on to our shores. I’m thinking late Wednesday afternoon or Thursday… then game on. I cannot wait to share with you the shelling effects of this storm later this week! Do YOU have a time prediction for this to happen? …

sanibel seashell beach