Lightning whelk marco

Lightning whelk

I’m still exhausted from boating yesterday. Clark, friend Mary Jo and I “adventured” to take our boat down to the sand bars off Marco to do some shelling. The gulf was calm and flat for our hour and a half boat ride down (if only it had stayed that way). We pulled up to our first sand bar where I found this beautiful LIGHTING WHELK.

Marco sand bar

Marco sand bar

There was a nice shell wrack that looked very picked over but there were too many SUNRAY VENUS CLAMS to count. They are always so pretty when they are together.

Sunray venus clams

Sunray venus clams

Then I thought I hit the jack pot….

Junonia piece

Junonia piece

Only half of a JUNONIA but it was still fun to find it. Maybe I’ll make a necklace like Kathy.

junonia part ap

Half of a junonia

I found a very nice size MOON SNAIL or NATICA which Mary Jo calls them.

Moon snail marco

Marco Moon snail

Mary Jo found a TUSK SHELL which is very tiny so you can see it would blend in with just about everything in the sand. I’ve only ever found one … I don’t have any eye for them yet.

Tusk shell

Tusk shell

I found just one WENTLETRAP in what looks like coffee ground camo. There were a few RICE OLIVES in there too…. but wait! I just looked closer at this photo and there is a TUSK SHELL in this photo I didn’t even see.

wentletrap in sand

wentletrap in sand

My best find of the day was this very different FLORIDA CONE. Look at the colors and stripes- wow!

Florida Cone marco

Florida Cone marco

I met Ron from Marco and he said he boats the islands to fish but if the fish aren’t biting, he shells.

Ron Marco sheller

Ron (Marco)

Marco sand bar

Mary Jo shelling

I won’t even tell you how many times we almost got stuck on the shallow flats. It’s not easy boating down there if you don’t know the waters (which we don’t). Then the boat ride back was 2 and a half hours back to the dock …..  the gulf was very choppy which makes the ride very intense (ugh). It was a beautiful day in Marco but I’m sure glad to be back on Sanibel. To be able to walk out on the beach to find incredible shells by the handful…. priceless.

Leopard Crab shell

Leopard Crab shell

Mary Jo Clark Marco

Mary Jo and Clark in Marco