Archive for Egg Casing

Apr
26

Beach Bling Is A Wonderful Thing

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beach bling flotsam sanibel gulf

If you want to learn the types of seashells, sea life, vegetation and what the different kinds of mollusk egg cases look like and live in the Gulf Of Mexico, you’ve got your chance this week. It all washed up on the beach on the East end of Sanibel.

beach bling flotsam

You can see it for miles. So many mollusk egg casings and PEN SHELLS galore!

mollusk egg cases Sanibel Florida

MERMAID PURSES! Well, they are really SKATE EGG CASES…

mermaid purse skate egg

HORSE CONCH EGG CASINGS (I shot this with the Nikon J1)…

horse conch mollusk egg case

WHELK EGG CHAINS…

mollusk egg casings beach

Lots of CRABS too. This one is a STONE CRAB…

stone crab sanibel florida

My friend Jane called me and said she found a dead crab shell on the beach that had a NAUTILUS  shell pattern. She has found a NAUTILUS before so she would know! Wanna see? CLICK HERE . So I went to see this crab…and it does have that pattern! It’s a FLAME BOX CRAB…

box crab jane

I also saw lots of SEA WHIPS. This was the first time I’ve ever found a WHITE SEA WHIP…

white sea whip

We normally just find the purple SEA WHIPS but when I went to see Jane’s FLAME BOX CRAB she showed me this bright yellow WHIP she picked up as well.

purple yellow sea whip

There were oodles of PURPLE SEA URCHINS also ( J1)…

purple sea urchin on seashells

I always get questions about the bones on the beach. They are from the bait in the crab traps… not random dead carcasses. LOL

beach bone flotsam

I also get a lot of questions about this guy on the left. It’s a SEA CUCUMBER…

sea cucumber sanibel

Don’t worry, I saw lots of shells too. Mainly, the double DOSINIAS.

Cyber Sheller Alert! This next photo is really big so you can do a little shelling and blinging…

dosinia sea shells sanibel cybershell

Looking through all this BEACH BLING, there are little treasures that look like this so you have to look closely…

turban horse conch shells

Some goodies were still washing in at the shoreline as well…

scattered shells south florida

The big find was by Seth (FL)! He found this huge HORSE CONCH on the sand bar near Donax Rd. Here he is with Erin and Reese…Erin Seth Reese

See? BEACH BLING is a wonderful thing… (J1)

beach bling flotsam jetsam

PS- Some of you know I’ve been testing a new Nikon J1 camera. It isn’t very spontaneous but when I do catch a nicer shot than with my spontaneous, trusty, easy, clear Panasonic DMC…. I’ve noted it.

 

 

 

Feb
12

Scouting The Beaches

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live orange horse conch

 After almost 2 days of high north/west winds, I bundled up in my warmest clothes then hit the 45 degree beach this morning. I know some of you are experiencing much lower temps than that ….. but geeez….the wind chill was killer. My finger tips almost froze off! This poor guy was not too happy either rolling in the surf but he was still healthy and kicking.

live horse conch

 I was a little surprised but there was only a few left over shells at the jetty rocks on Captiva…

jetty rocks captiva florida blind pass

One side of the sand bar in the pass had a few COCKLES and CALICO SCALLOPS…

Captiva Blind Pass cockle sunrise

The other side had no shells but still had a beautiful view…

sand bar sunrise captiva

 Then I went home. Late this afternoon, I couldn’t stand it. I went back to Blind Pass to scout out the beach again thinking the shells were finally coming in.

seasheller sun glow

Not yet still! But I did find Susan from Fort Walton Beach, FL. She found a few treasures including this double ALTERNATE TELLIN…

Susan Captiva seashell

 There were a few LETTERED OLIVES, FIGHTING CONCHS and COCKLES to brighten the day. I also saw lots of HORSE CONCH EGG CASES…

horse conch egg case

Tomorrow, the mercury will start to rise. Oh thank goodness. And maybe we’ll see some shell piles too!

sunset sanibel blind pass turner beach

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Jan
24

Rare Sighting! Mauve-Mouth Drill Egg Case

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mauve-mouth drill egg case

This is so wild. Attached to a SUNRAY VENUS CLAM, were fresh egg cases that these MAUVE-MOUTH DRILLS just produced!

Calotrophon ostrearum egg case mauve mouth drill

MurexKen found this fascinating nest just after MurexAlice had shown me those cute little MORTON’S EGG COCKLES on yesterdays post (hmmm- the “egg” theme continues, huh?). I was tickled that he called me over to show me this egg case that I’ve never seen before. The babies look like little pods of pollen sitting in a beautiful flower. Mk and MA are quite a pair for finding the unexpected!

live mauve-mouth drill egg case

I’m not quite sure, but I think the shell on the left was still laying some eggs. I hated to disturb them so after taking a few photos, we returned the mollusks and eggs to the water to make sure they produce healthy babies.

sunray venus with mauve-mouth drill egg case

You can see this one’s aperture with just a bit of the “mauve” showing around his body.

live mauve-mouth drill

Oh wait…. just in case you can’t remember what a MAUVE-MOUTH DRILL looks like when you find them empty on the beach, here are a few pictures to refresh your memory…

mauve mouth drill

Now you’ll see why they call it “mauve-mouth”. They have a mauve or purple in the aperture when they are alive or freshly dead.

Mauve mouth drill aperture

Out of all these shells in our collection at home, I could only find one that had a mauve mouth.

mauve-mouth drills Calotrophon ostrearum

I don’t find MAUVE-MOUTH DRILLS that often so to see live ones that are laying eggs was really pretty exceptional. I’m not sure if this would be considered scientifically  ”rare” to see this out beach combing, but it was rare for me. Great finds MK and MA!

mauve-mouth drills

 

Dec
19

Merry Holiday Beach Art

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Seashell Christmas tree beach

Merry Christmas, SS Marcia! In my last post, Marcia asked me if I had seen beach art yet. I had to laugh when the first thing I saw when I walked on the beach was this Christmas tree made with PEN SHELLS. Then right beside it was this beautiful menorah! This is the first that I’ve seen this season so thank you to the beach art artist who made these!

seashell menorah beach

 There was so much Beach Bling in between Donax Rd and Fulgur Rd on Sanibel.

Sanibel Beach bling urchin

 This was one of several TULIP EGG CASES I saw…

Tulip egg case Sanibel Florida beach

 I didn’t even see the second KEYHOLE LIMPET on the left when I took this photo. I was so amazed at the dark stripes on the big LIMPET and the colors on the tiny APPLE MUREX and BANDED TULIP.

keyhole limpets with miniature shells

 In one little area, the high tide was bringing in shells to build up this nice pile. See that gorgeous LIGHTNING WHELK?

whelk seashells Sanibel beach

Maybe the golden rays of this Sanibel sunset shining on the amber edges of the ROUGH PENS will inspire the richly talented artists who create their beach art masterpieces for we mere beachcombers to fill our hearts with joy for the holidays. Ahem…. did I ask that nicely enough for more fun holiday beach art stuff? ;)

Sanibel Beach Bling at sunset