Archive for White Pelican
White Pelican Rescue On Sanibel’s Out Islands
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We are so fortunate to see spectacular WHITE PELICANS when they migrate to SouthWest Florida every year in the fall. Unfortunately, we found one injured or sick WHITE PELICAN while boating around the Out Islands of Sanibel and Captiva yesterday on New Year’s Day. Clark found him washed up to the shore line and saw he wasn’t even strong enough to flap his wings.
Poor thing! But our friend John completely took charge and checked the bird for visible injuries or obstructions like fishing line caught in his feet or wings. You can see just how big this bird is while John inspects his wing. White Pelicans have an average wingspan of 10 feet.
We could not see any physical injuries to his wings, neck or feet so we called Sanibel’s CROW (Clinic for the Rehabilitation Of Wildlife) to see if they could help. CROW First Responder Gareth wanted us to bring the bird (we named him “Whitey” by this time) in to see if they could help save him. So the rescue began… John held Whitey safely in his arms to get him back to the boat.
We wrapped a towel over the Whitey’s head and back to keep him calm and safe so Captain Clark could drive the “rescue” boat to a dock in Captiva…
It was nice to have CROW volunteers meet us at the dock to bring a large cage to safely carry Whitey the rest of the way in my car to the clinic on Sanibel…
Jane (John’s wife) and I admitted Whitey to CROW as their 4th patient of the new year where they took him immediately to the exam room to give him fluids and meds to stabilize him.
We really don’t know for sure what made him sick or if he was just an old guy (or girl… we really dont know that either). All we know is that we tried to save him and John was the hero. On the boat ride back to the dock, we sang the song “Johnny Angel” to John and changed some of the words to “Johnny Rescue”. 
Mother Nature will now decide his fate while the compassionate caregivers at CROW do their best to help him. I am so thankful he was only one out of the hundreds of healthy and stunning WHITE PELICANS we saw flocking around our islands yesterday who come back every year. They are a sight to behold!
Write From The Beach GiveAway!
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a Sand Dollar.... breathes through its feet
I have been combing the beaches all my life finding seashells and beach treasures, viewing sea life and beach birds. This summer I was so inspired by all of these beautiful beach creatures I photograph and blog about that I decided to pick up the paint brush again. One thing led to another and before I knew it, I had 16 designs that I packaged into notecard gift packs with FUN FACTS about each sea creature for a fun twist. Check a few out…..
a Horse Conch ... makes ocean sounds if it's next to your ear
a Dolphin ... sleeps with one eye open and one eye closed
They really do! Half of their brain sleeps while the other half is awake…. so the half that’s asleep- the eye closes.
a White Pelican ... has an average wingspan of 10 feet
They are HUGE!
Here’s what the front of the Sea Life box looks like…
a Seahorse ... has a single mate for life
There are 4 designs (2 each) in each 8-pack box of Seashells, Beach Treasures, Sea Life and Birds.
Back of the Beach Treasures box
So now you know what I’ve been up to when I’m not blogging. I am very excited that some of my favorite retailers already have them in their stores- check them out! Click on Store Locations .
AND now for the GIVEAWAY!……
Win 4 boxes of Write From The Beach notecards as a “thank you” for your inspiration….
- i Love Shelling Seashells
- Sea Life
- Hello, Birdies
- Beach Treasures
- Free Shipping in U.S. (outside U.S.?- We’ll work something out)
Here’s how to win……
Go to WriteFromTheBeach.com to look at all 4 boxed notecards and photos of each individual card, then come back here to make a comment HERE ON THIS POST (comments on Writefromthebeach.com will be disqualified-sorry!). Just tell me which ones you like best…or any comment will do because the pick will be random.
That’s it! Just make a comment HERE on or before Friday, September 3, 2010
If you don’t know how to make a comment- Click on the Title of this post (Write From The Beach GiveAway!) and scroll to the bottom then follow directions. Or you can click on the number in parenthesis (for example (1) or (0) ) after where it says “By pam – Comments” under the post title.
Tulip Eats King’s Crown
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A Tulip eating a King's Crown
On the out islands of Captiva, Clark found this huge live TULIP hanging so far out of it’s shell eating a live KING’S CROWN. You can see the powerfully pink inside of this mollusk sucking that KING’S CROWN right out of his shell. Amazing and so cool to see! Most everything we found today (except some WORM SHELLS and a few LIGHTENING WHELKS) was alive, very healthy and eating good meals so, to us, it’s a great sign.
Clark’s sister Jan was here visiting from her log cabin in Montana with her boyfriend Jack. Jack couldn’t imagine why we wanted to go “shelling”…. but after he saw Clark pull that hungry TULIP out of the water he kinda started to get it. Jan told him that shelling is something that she remembers doing with the family as far back as she can remember on the shores of New Jersey.
Jack and Jan (Montana) with Clark
A live King's Crown in shallow water
A dried out baby Horseshoe Crab
It’s worth mentioning again (November 27th post) about HORSESHOE CRABS. They are one of the few species that are older than dinosaurs. It’s amazing they are still alive and well living in our waters. We’ve seen them breeding before but I didn’t have my camera…..I’ll have a picture one day….I’m hoping!
Jack and Jan with Clark and the White Pelicans in the background
Giving Thanks
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Jeff and Tiia
Our friends Jeff and Tiia came over from Miami to join us for Thanksgiving along with our other good friends Libby and Michael to do a little shelling. Since we had the beach on North Captiva to ourselves, we had no trouble finding the best shells. Although we didn’t find big piles of shells, there was a string of them along the shoreline. Tiia found SAND DOLLARS (she’s showing a few in the photo), SUNRAY VENUSES, LETTERED OLIVES, and lots of URCHINS. Jeff and Clark found some nice WORM SHELLS.
Shelling was the perfect way to burn off some of our incredible feast on Useppa Island where we pigged out on oysters, crab, shrimp, turkey, stuffing, gravy…..all of the fixins, plus the most fantastic bourbon pecan pie and pumpkin pie you could imagine (don’t worry, Mom- yours is still my favorite).
Libby and Michael
Libby (yes, that Libby from BestOfSanibelCaptiva.com!) found SAND DOLLARS too but she found something even more amazing. After a 10 to 15 minute walk down the beach she got some photographs of the WHITE PELICANS that come to spend the winter in Southwest Florida and this is one of the favorite spots to hang out.
I’m thankful that I got to spend this special day with special friends.
Enjoy some of the scenery that we got to see today thanks to Libby’s great photography below.
White pelicans in flight Photo by Libby McMillan
White pelicans on a bar Photo by Libby McMillan
Libby's sand dollar
North Cap shells
