Archive for Baby’s Ear
Shells And Smiles
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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.
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.
Alicia was thrilled to collect SAILOR’S EARS, ARKS, DOSINIAS, YELLOW PRICKLY COCKLES and SCALLOPS.
The wrack line was loaded with all of the shells…
There were a few BABYS EARS mixed in there too…
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.
Smiling Carol and Terry are showing off their shelling love too!
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!
Yesterday’s Surf Advisory
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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.
Shawn from Kansas was in perfect Sanibel Stoop position so I figured he had already found some goodies…
He found a nice mix of shells. I looove that LACE MUREX with the link top…
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!
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!
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.
More PAPER FIG EGG CASINGS…
Low and behold, I found a BABY’S EAR turned upside down in the bling…
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.
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?
PS- The DOLPHINS and PELICANS were playing this morning too!
The Beach is Always Worth The Trip
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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.
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!
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.
Leo from Chicago showed me some cool live creatures he found before he set the free in the water.
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.
This wrack line looks like a good sign to me for the next few days.
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.
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?
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.
This Weekend Rocked
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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.
She was even happier to find 9 BABY’S EARS…
Then to top it all off she framed her Sanibel Six in a very creative MANGROVE SEED POD picture frame.
I met another blog buddy Candice from St Pete! She saw Clark with his shelling backhoe and asked him “Are you Clark?” LOL
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.
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…
Aha! That’s where the big WHELK was that we were looking for. Jennifer (Sanibel) had already found that prize AND three ALPHIES!
Nice finds, Jennifer!
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.
Look at it close up…
Rock on and have a happy Monday!
Turkey Wings and Rice, a Cone and Candy
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Don’t get your taste buds all worked up about TURKEY, RICE or CANDY because I’m talking seashells, of course! We found lots of mini “morsels” at the lighthouse over the weekend including these two TURKEY WINGS (the biggest one is only about an inch long) and two TAMPA TURRIDS in the photo above and RICE OLIVES and BABY’S EARS in this next photo.
Along with the usual ANGULATE WENTLETRAPS, I found a BROWN BANDED WENTLETRAP too….
…. And some AUGERS and little FIGHTING CONCHS.
And to top it all off with some sweet candy, we found two HORSE CONCHS and baby ALPHABET CONE.
I met William and Melissa (Jacksonville, FL) filling their shells bags with SCALLOP shells, CONCHS and some MUREXES.
I found out this was their first trip to Sanibel so I showed them how to find WENTLETRAPS too..
I met another Shelling Sister Sanibel Stooper on the beach too…. this little cutie Lucy! She was having a ball with this COCKLE shell on the beach with her parents Jeff and Tammy.
And look what I found again…. a SMOOTH DUCK CLAM. Maybe it isn’t that unusual (?)
Unfortunately, it’s so thin and fragile, it broke when I got it back to the house……oops!
There were so many SAILOR’S EARS, I bunched a few together and that’s when I saw the SMOOTH DUCK CLAM too.
Sailors ears
Just a reminder- If you haven’t entered the Susick Sea Shell Sifter Giveaway yet, CLICK HERE to win!
The Rewards Of Social Shelling
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Is there anything cuter than little kids collecting shells on the beach? Little Bella from Ocala was the first person I saw when I got to the lighthouse beach yesterday evening so I knew it would be a fun night. And it was…. because then I met newlyweds Bryn and Nathaniel who love to shell together so much that Nathaniel proposed to Bryn with a JUNONIA shell! Now that’s love! Congratulations to you!
Then I found out that she was the daughter of Robin from my post back in April Smiles For Seashells . She was there too and found a really nice size BABY’S EAR. I love that happy smile!
Robin’s close- up BABY’S EAR…..
Then Robin told us where the real action was. In the water. Sheri from Texas found a shellovely LIGHTNING WHELK by sittin-n-siftin in the shallows at the tip of the lighthouse beach.
This Texan gal found her state shell! You see she was prepared with her trusty garden claw for digging.
We dug around out in the water too and found all but the TULIP in the Sanibel Six ( the OLIVE didn’t make it in the photo).
So in the midst of our socializing, Clark and I were WENTLTRAP-ing and found a little DUSKY CONE along with a little candy and lots of good WENTLETRAPS.
Instead of the sky being black with rain clouds last night, there was a beautiful, colorful swirling sky right over the lighthouse…. magical.
PS- I’m trying to get into the “cool” blogger club (not really such a thing… or is there? Like Groucho Marx said “I don’t want to be a member of a club that would have me as a member” heehee) so I’ve added a few social buttons below each post to finally get into the internet world of 2011. You can now “Like” a post for Facebook, tweet this post if you have Twitter, if you have a google account (gmail) you can hit the +1 (Google’s answer to the ”Like” button) or you can submit it to StumbleUpon. I would be grateful if you clicked any of them! We can be the cool kids together… wait, we already are- nothing gets cooler than the hanging out at the beach!
