Archive for Baby’s Ear

gone shelling i love shelling

Everybody needs a vacation… even when you live in a paradise like Sanibel. So, I am unplugging from online life for a week or so to take a break and recharge the brain. I know! You need shelling reports! I am NOT leaving you high and dry without shelling updates so…. Captain Brian to the rescue!

Captain Brian 008 Holaway

Captain Brian Holaway will be right here posting his fabulous photos of our local beaches just like he does on his blog Capt. Brian On The Water . You won’t miss a beat to get your up-to-date shelling fix. Fair? Okay, if you haven’t heard me talk about our good friend Captain Brian before, he is the best shelling guide I know.

captain brian starfish

.. and he REALLY loves shelling too. Can you tell?

capt brian seashells

Oooooh… He has a box of BABY’S EARS!

captain brian babys ears

Ahhhhhh…  WORM SHELLS!

captain brian worm shells

He even collects TUSK SHELLS like we do but we’ve never found one this big!

capt brian tusk shell

Wow! Look at these gorgeous shells…

capt brian best seashells

Did you notice he has The Elite Three? A JUNONIA, SCOTCH BONNET and LION’S PAWS.

capt brian elite three

 Captain Brian has a great eye for shells but he also has a great eye for nature and wildlife. He is in the Florida Master Naturalist program to promote awareness, understanding, and respect the environment of Florida’s natural world.

Captain Brian Holaway Master Naturalist

 See? I’ve left you in very capable hands.

Margarita, please. (Oh sorry, I’m just getting ready for vacation.)

So enjoy the next few posts by Brian then I will be back with a refreshed mind and hopefully some awesome shelling reports to share.

Oh yes, I’ll have that margarita with salt. (Oh sorry, again.. I keep getting interupted)

See you soon, dear friends!

Sllluuuuurpppp. Ahhhhhhh

 

Apr
13

Captiva Cruises Boat To Cayo Costa

Posted by: | Comments (17)

cayo costa south west florida

Another Spring Break adventure! On Wednesday, Lori, Hayley, Culter and I went to the secluded island of Cayo Costa to relax and enjoy another gorgeous day on the islands.captiva cruises sign

I had problems getting out our own boat  (Clark was busy at work so he couldn’t help) so we decided to take the easy route and hop on the Captiva Cruises shelling boat Play Time for the afternoon trip.

play time captiva boat

Low and behold, guess who our captain was… my buddy Captain Brian Holaway! It was a nice surprise!

captain brian

After securing the boat on the south tip of Cayo Costa, Capt Brian walked over to our shelling spot to join us for a few minutes and immediately picked up an ALBINO YELLOW PRICKLY COCKLE. Wow, can he spot those albinos! Remember he won a red ribbon for his ALBINO WHELK at the Sanibel Shell Show this year? Amazing!

albino cockle

 I didn’t find an albino but I quickly found a handful of my own fave honeys.

angel wings baby ears

BABY’S EARS and FALSE ANGEL WINGS (they look like cute little juvie ANGEL WINGS)…

babys ears false angel wings

 Lots of beauteous JINGLES…

jingle seashells

A couple of CLOUDY PERIWINKLES…

cloudy periwinkle

cloudy periwikles

 I also found a PURPLISH SEMELE (left) and a CANCELLATE SEMELE (right). I’m not sure why I don’t find more of these on Sanibel but I have better luck finding them on Cayo Costa, North Captiva and in Marco. hmmmm

purplish and cancellate semele

I had thought at one time that this BRYOZOAN COLONY was a type of CORAL but as you can see side by side… it’s not a piece of CORAL like the branch on the right. I found both of these past the tree roots on the Gulf side of the beach. (click HERE for more info on Bryozoan Colony)

bryozoa coral difference

Okay, this one might not be your taste but I thought this SOUTHERN RIBBED MUSSEL was just so pretty for some reason. One day, when I get a fancy camera to show you the nice details up close and personal, I promise…I’ll be able to capture more of the beauty in some of these obscure seashells.

southern ribbd mussel

 After combing, sunning and shelling this gorgeous beach, Hayley, Cutler and Lori (VA) headed back to the boat with me after one more climb on the BLACK MANGROVE tree roots.

hayley cutler lori cayo costa

On the boat ride back, I couldn’t help but see how excited Margie, Kristi and Mike (California) were about their seashell loot!

margie kristi mike california

 They found oodles of ATLANTIC GIANT COCKLES…

shells cayo costa south florida

 Quite a few humongus SUNRAY VENUS CLAMS…

sunray venus cayo costa

 And a really big LEOPARD CRAB shell.

leopard crab cayo costa

 It was a perfect day on the water with calm aqua seas, warm temps in the 80s and DOLPHINS surrounding the boat.

dolphin captiva cruises boat

And to top if off, it was great being with good friends and having lots of seashell souvenirs to bring home to remember the day.

seashells cayo costa

 

Mar
19

Shells And Smiles

Posted by: | Comments (18)

broad paper cockle sanibel florida

I’ve been trying to remind myself not to ignore the BIVALVES in search of “CONES and JUNONES” (as my friend Rob calls them) so when I saw this BROAD PAPER COCKLE on Sanibel I smiled as big as the gulf. We just don’t have many in our collection so it’s nice to find something different.

broad paper cockle interior beach

Alicia (St Louis) and Lamont didn’t ignore the BIVALVES. They were enjoying every moment of collecting the riches on the beach of Sanibel’s east end with smiles from ear to ear.

sanibel scallop alicia lamont

Alicia was thrilled to collect SAILOR’S EARS, ARKS, DOSINIAS, YELLOW PRICKLY COCKLES and SCALLOPS.

alicia seashells sanibel

The wrack line was loaded with all of the shells…

seashell wrack line

 There were a few BABYS EARS mixed in there too…

babys ear seashell sanibel

 Throughout the last couple of weeks I’ve run into shellers as crazy as I am about shelling. Rob was proudly wearing iLoveShelling Junonia and Lions Paw Club buttons he made. How cute! And so was his smile too.

rob with buttons

 Smiling Carol and Terry are showing off their shelling love too!

skip & vicki 3-5-12 010

I saved the best for last with Janet and her huge smile showing off her first JUNONIA she found on her birthday in February. Congrats to you Janet!

janet junonia

Comments (18)
Feb
20

Yesterday’s Surf Advisory

Posted by: | Comments (27)

Sanibel beached nutmeg

After hearing there was a surf advisory with high SW winds yesterday, I couldn’t wait to see the beach filled with seashells and cool Beach Bling.

cloudy morning sanibel lighthouse

 Shawn from Kansas was in perfect Sanibel Stoop position so I figured he had already found some goodies…

collecting shells Sanibel island

 He found a nice mix of shells. I looove that LACE MUREX with the link top…

shawn seashells

After talking to him, we realized that I had met his mom a few weeks ago, She’s Shelling Sistah Karen from that special day “When Shelling Worlds Collide“. Hi Karen! Now I met your son Shawn!

shawn kansas with sanibel seashells

 Massachusetts girls Kristin, Chloe and Haley were having a blast finding PAPER FIGS, SEA URCHINS and STARFISH. Most of the STARFISH were alive so they went back to the water but there were a few dried in the high wrack line. A souvenir!

Kristin, Chloe, Haley girls sanibel beach

 I didn’t see many shells on the pier side of the Sanibel lighthouse but there was plenty of SARGASSUM. This is a type of seaweed provides a rich environment for marine animals like SEA TURTLES.

sargassum

 More PAPER FIG EGG CASINGS

paper fig egg cases

Low and behold, I found a BABY’S EAR turned upside down in the bling…

upside down babys ear

 And just to get my heart racing, half way buried in the sand I saw the ribs of a LION’S PAW. I reached down to dig it out … and came up with a broken piece. That’s ok! Where there’s a broken piece today, there may be a whole piece tomorrow.

piece of lions paw sanibel

 We’ve had so many beautiful calm days for weeks and weeks. This is a wonderful thing for most people, right? But for us shellers, give us some messy weather! This wind was a start but maybe just 2 days back to back of high west winds… then it can go back to perfectly gorgeous island weather. Am I being too selfish?

low tide sanibel

 PS- The DOLPHINS and PELICANS were playing this morning too!

dolphin pelican sanibel gulf

Comments (27)
Nov
16

The Beach is Always Worth The Trip

Posted by: | Comments (15)

Sanibel causeway sunset

I had to pull the car over on one of the causeway islands last night on my way back to Sanibel because the sunset was so pretty. It always makes running errands so much more enjoyable when I can time it to return to the island at sunset. Ahhhh. Makes it worth it.

seashells on beach Sanibel

I also thought it was worth the trip to Blind Pass today to see if the shells were starting to show up again. To me, the shells have seemed a little scarce there lately for some reason. We’ve just had so much sand filling in again so I’ve been hoping for some good west winds to bring back the shells. I’m seeing more showing up now! Especially BITTERSWEETS. I saw quite a few today!

bittersweet seashell

I think this is the first BABY’S EAR that I’ve ever found at Blind Pass Sanibel. After I found this one, I found one more in the same area mixed in with the same type Beach Bling.

babys ear beach bling

Leo from Chicago showed me some cool live creatures he found before he set the free in the water.

Leo Chicago pen shell urchin

This is a live PURPLE SEA URCHIN hanging on to a live PEN SHELL. See how the PEN SHELL is partly opened? This is how Sandy The Sanderling got in trouble by putting her beak in there. It slammed shut on her beak and wouldn’t let go. Ouch! If you missed that story click HERE.

Live pen shell live purple sea urchin

This wrack line looks like a good sign to me for the next few days.

Captiva seashells on sandbar

I didn’t find loads of shells today but it was just good to get back on the beach on this beautiful day. I like quality these days over quantity. My BITTERSWEETS and BABY’S EARS made my day soooo much better.

seashells and waves

I’m getting back into my routine so I’ll be out tomorrow again to find out if there are any other shell spots hiding out there. Have you been finding great shells lately?

Sanibel causeway sunset closer

I want to thank you guys again for your feedback on my new i Love Shelling Shop. I’ll continue to add designs and merchandise so you can stay closer to Sanibel and we all can show off our love for shelling.

i love shelling mug

 

Sep
12

This Weekend Rocked

Posted by: | Comments (24)

diane in surf

My friend Diane joined Clark and me on the beach off West Gulf Drive yesterday for a lovely afternoon of shell seeking. We wanted to find a big WHELK like last week but she was just as happy with a candy HORSIE CONCH.

Diane with beach candy

She was even happier to find 9 BABY’S EARS…

babys ears on pen shell

Then to top it all off she framed her Sanibel Six in a very creative MANGROVE SEED POD picture frame.

sanibel 6 mangrove seed

I met another blog buddy Candice from St Pete! She saw Clark with his shelling backhoe and asked him “Are you Clark?” LOL

Candice iLS sanibel

She said she wasn’t finding much, so I walked with her just for a few minutes and we found a few goodies… 3 ALTERNATE TELLINS, a PURPLISH TAGELUS, COQUINA, FALSE ANGEL WING, 2 CONCHS, a LACE MUREX, a TURBAN and a beautiful BABY’S EAR.

candice shells

All of Candice’s shells were found on the high and dry wrack line on the far right of this next picture. On the sand bars, there were hundreds of FIGHTING CONCHS  and a few bigger shells…

shells at low tide

Aha! That’s where the big WHELK was that we were looking for. Jennifer (Sanibel) had already found that prize AND three ALPHIES!

Jennifer's shells

Nice finds, Jennifer!

Jennifer Sanibel cones whelk

Clark didn’t find another big WHELK but he did find a huuu-jahh piece of WORM ROCK. He knows this is another fave of mine. It doesn’t look like anything fabulous in this photo but trust me, it’s cool. This is a rock formed by a colony of VARIABLE WORM SNAILS (not exactly the same thing as my “wormie shells” we find) and it’s not every day for us to find it this big.

worm rock

Look at it close up…

worm rock copy

Rock on and have a happy Monday!

sand dollar in tidal pool