Long spined sea urchin

I don’t see LONG SPINED URCHINS often but it seems they get washed up after a good wind blow. We had 20 mph north west winds yesterday so I saw lots of shells and live creatures washed up on the beach at Blind Pass this morning.  This guy was still alive as well as lots of FIGHTING CONCHS and other shells so we put them back into the gulf for hopes of survival and more breeding.

Don's Alphabets and numeg

These  ALPHABET CONES were not alive and they were just a few good shell finds Don from Vermont. He was out on the sand bar on the Sanibel side of Blind Pass before sunrise with a head lamp. Here’s a shot of his other shells he found this morning ….

Don's shells and head lamp

Yes, that’s a gorgeous TRUE TULIP on the right. You can see how deep the water was crossing over to the sand bar by looking at Don’s shirt below… if you can take your eyes off that beautiful red TULIP he’s holding.

Don's true tulip

So to recap, Don got to Blind Pass at the crack of dawn, worked really hard to find all these beach treasures,  practically had to swim back to get to the main beach…. then ends up giving most of his shells away to a couple he just met on the beach. He even made sure they knew all the correct shell names. What a nice guy!

Don showing Sara and Bob different shells

Look at all of these treasure Don gave Sara and Bob. So sweet.

Sara's new seashell

Sara and Bob (OH)

I walked over the bridge to the Captiva side of the pass and met Shanti and Barry that were visiting from the east coast of Florida for the weekend to do some shelling.

Shanti and Barry (Pompano, FL)

They told me they didn’t know what a WENTLETRAP was before they found… us! They are blog buddies (!) so they wanted to see what Blind Pass had in store after the north west winds. They also told me they had to run down to the lighthouse to see if they could find some of those WENTLETRAPS we talk about. I’m sure you’ll have good luck since you’ve already had a good start with this bucket of goodies.

Shanti's seashells

I met another sheller who was mostly collecting KITTEN’S PAWS.

Tamara (VA)

Tamara is a preschool music teacher who was collecting KITTEN’S PAWS to give to her students with an added pearl inside and a note saying “You are precious”. Really, I don’t make this stuff up. These people I meet are genuinely this nice and it gives me so much pleasure to spread the word that shelling attracts these amazing people.

Fighting conchs

These are a few FIGHTING CONCHS and other shells we found this morning.

Banded Tulips

Kings crown

Lightning whelk

After listening to one of the 6th graders at the Sanibel Shell Fair and Show last week in my video, I saw this LIGHTNING WHELK and immediately assumed this was a female since the color is getting a little lighter. Hmmm. Ya think?

Pear whelk in scallop shell

I always love to see PEAR WHELKS! They just seem special to me.

For those of you who like to keep up with the changes at Blind Pass, I made a little video today. You can see the differences with the tide change and of course, the changes that occur everyday with the sand shifting by the wind and current.