Archive for Blind Pass Video
Ever Changing Blind Pass Sanibel
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It sure feels good to find an ALPHABET CONE again! I’ve been stumped finding the SANIBEL SIX lately so I was excited to find this baby within a half hour of arriving at Blind Pass Sanibel yesterday evening for a somewhat low tide at a .4. I still didn’t find the SANIBEL SIX though since I couldn’t find a TULIP that was in good enough shape but I’m subbing that bright orange CHESTNUT TURBAN on the right as a good find to be very happy.
See how that sand bar has moved right to the beach now? You never know what to expect the beach to look like until you walk out and see if for yourself. Always a surprise.
The tidal pool was loaded with live FIGHTING CONCHS …
On the other side of the tidal pool, shellers were lined up along the shoreline to catch the seashell loot washing up to the beach.
I met so many cool shellers like Joe and Kerry from Sebastian, FL…
..and Karen and Steve from Michigan…
Karen found two gorgeous bright orange CHESTNUT TURBANS.
Here are Tim and Mary Ann (NY) showing off Mary Ann’s cool shell sifter.
I think the prize of the evening was Tim’s incredibly large FLORIDA SPINY JEWELBOX with attached valves. It’s terrific!
Anna (West Virginia) was tickled pink as she filled up her strainer with shells.
She found FIGHTING CONCHS, MUREXES, COCKLES, SCALLOPS and a pretty little TRUE TULIP.
Bob and Johnnie (TN) were on one of the shell piles searching for minis.
And they found them! I loooove this tiny little lemon yellow ROUGH SCALLOP…
They found some other colorful cuties too including a sweet FLAT SCALLOP…
It was a fabulous night meeting so many nice people and seeing the shell piles on the Sanibel side again.
Thank you Donnie (the cone man) for letting me know I needed to get down to Blind Pass to see this! Yes! I needed a break from that stupid camera any way. No, I didn’t take any of theses photos with the J1 and by the word “stupid”, I think you can tell I’m still frustrated with it ;( . Anyway, I took a quick little video with my trusted little Panasonic DMC-ZS6 to pan the beach to show you exactly what it looked like and how the beach has changed…. yet again. Oh, and sorry about the sound. The wind noise is horrible but oh well, I just wanted y’all to see it any way.
UPDATE! Set your DVRs and Tivos for Sunday morning!!!
I forgot to mention the Sanibel/seashell story I spoke in my about March 1 post should be airing this Sunday, April 22nd on CBS Sunday Morning.We don’t know exactly when the segment will air, but the show is on 9 – 10:30am (EST) and Bill’s pieces usually run towards the last half hour of the show (10-10:30 Eastern). The disclaimer is that this is TV, and anything can happen – so it is confirmed best to all of our abilities.
Welcome Winter Whipping Winds
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When the winter winds start coming from the north, we (shellers, maybe not sun worshippers) welcome the chilly, high winds because we know that they will be bringing shells soon. That’s exactly what happened last night… wind gusts of 30 mph coming from the NW so I already found some goodies at Blind Pass Captiva this morning. I took a virtually shelling video to share the beach combing walk. I don’t know why I said winds of 12 mph… they were higher than that. AND I can’t believe how many good shells I missed! There was a WORMIE sitting right there and I didn’t even see it! And there was a LIGHTNING WHELK in the crevice of the rock that I didn’t see either! Dang! But I did find another one. I didn’t have my coffee yet so maybe that’s why I was a little spacey. Any hoo…. enjoy the cyber shelling…
PS- I still haven’t gotten a chance to photograph Clark’s monster shells yet so bear with me. It might even get pushed back a few more days too since this shelling weather has moved in- hopefully we will be a bit busy!
Cyber Shelling Video Unedited
Posted by: | CommentsMy video today is just raw footage of Clark and me shelling at Blind Pass Captiva. Warning: I didn’t add any music, I move the camera a little fast, there are spots on the lens from the spray and because it just rained on us, it’s kinda hard to hear Clark and I didn’t edit a thing. You’d think I would have the hang of this by now, but I don’t think I will ever totally think of the camera first over finding a treasure. But! It was so much fun to see and video all those goodies in the surf as I promised in my last post I Heart Sanibel And Captiva. So I know you’ll understand. Enjoy the cyber shelling!
After North West Winds
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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. 
Winner By Technical Conch… I mean… Knock Out
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Mark (Iowa) with winning conch
….And in the Sanibel corner with his winning FIGHTING CONCH… is Mark from Iowa! This CONCH is a knock out! I just love this picture with the “bystanders” looking amazed at the “winner” holding up his prize shell. LOL But let me back up a bit….. I was watching a few shellers out on the new Sanibel sand bar at Blind Pass wondering how deep the water was to get out to the bar. Most days there is a rip current running through this water “gully” so this could be very dangerous. The current today was not strong because it was so calm and still so it was the perfect day to check it out. I saw a guy getting ready to cross over the deeper water to get to the sand bar so I took a video….
Then I saw him put on his snorkel when he reached the sand bar…..
Snorkeling for shells
He headed just beyond the sand bar then only five minutes later, I saw him find something big.
It was Mark! We witnessed this whole amazing find so I had to wait until he came back over to the main land to see this HORSE CONCH for myself.
Mark (Iowa)
It was a perfectly empty huge HORSE CONCH…. and of course, as luck would have it, this was his very first time shelling. Huh? He swims over to a sand bar and five minutes later, he pulls out the treasure every sheller dreams about. Crazy.
Mark's horse conch on the beach
I saw other shellers cross over to the bar too…..
Sheller crossing
Preston came back with this gorgeous LIGHTNING WHELK. It looks like an albino!
Preston (Kentucky)
Then Tommy made it back over on his dad’s shoulders…..
Shelling shoulders
He brought back a LIGHTING WHELK too.
Tommy with whelk
It was an exceptionally beautiful calm day at Blind pass with exceptional shelling. Shellers, birds, sailors, plane pilots, sunners and stand up paddle boarders were out to enjoy the day.
