Donnie Benton junonia

 Donnie Benton found his first JUNONIA! He sooooo deserves it. He was at the lighthouse beach at 4 a.m. at low tide  searching for ALPHABET CONES (his faves) when he saw those beautiful spots half buried in the sand. Congrats Donnie! I know it’s such a high.

donnie benton hand junonia

I first heard of Donnie when his 5 year old daughter Alyssa found a JUNONIA and a SCOTCH BONNET within a few months of each other. I met Donnie (Ft Myers) in September and quickly realized that he was …. well…. he is obsessed about shelling. ;) I showed you some of his finds last week from Blind Pass while I was at the golf cart parade. They were good but now he has the golden treasure.

donnie benton hand junonia aperture

He was the first one on the beach for the low, low tides (negative .5) on Friday and Saturday and these are just some of the shells he found. He even picks up trash (the sunglasses and goggles)…

Donnie seashells

 Here’s another shot of the Big J, some of his ALPHIES and a few more…

donnie seashells lighthouse beach

We were on the beach at sunrise when we saw Donnie and found some goodies too but this was the coolest. It’s a live PAPER FIG with the mollusk wrapped around its shell.

live paper fig surrounded by mollusk

 I couldn’t help but pick it up to look at the other side…Wow!

live paper fig out of aperture

 Oops! I forgot to show you this! Some of you noticed the odd round “thingie” in the photo above of Donnie’s haul. We think it’s a vertebrae from some very large animal/fish/mammal. Whatever it is, it’s very cool.

donnie hand sea life vertabrae

Congrats again Donnie!!!!!