Combing through the BLING. On a SEAHORSE beach grass sleigh, Over the beaches she goes, Laughing all the way! Ho Ho Ho
Merry Christmas, Mimi! Mimi from Memphis found this beautiful SEAHORSE tangled up in the BEACH BLINGÂ grasses by Gulfside City Park.
It was like Santa buckled that SEAHORSE up in a open Beach Grass sleigh then sent it on its way for Mimi to find her gift from the sea. There had to be hundreds of other beach combers that walked passed those bundles of BLING but it took Mimi’s patience and keen eye to pick through those weeds to find her beach treasure. I think Santa knew that she would be that special sheller to find it.
Congratshellations Mimi! I am so happy I was there to witness your merry rare find and spend a glorious morning on the beach with you and Al!
Wow…great find !
I’d love to find a seahorse. My sister found a nice one on Cayo Costa a couple years ago with Capt. Brian.
That first photo made me laugh out loud!
Wow!! Great find!! Love seahorses!! I have a seahorse birdbath.
Those are great photos! And what an awesome find! I would’ve never thought to look through all that bling.
~Marielle
Ah yes! I was right there when Mimi found it! What a great find! Perfectly dried out and ready to display! :)
Pam,
Mimi and I really enjoyed meeting you, Clark and Susan. It was certainly fun sharing Mimi’s find. Not only do we find great shells on Sanibel we also meet the nicest people like the three of you.
Thanks for sharing Sanibel treasures with so many.
Al and Mimi
Hope your traveling went well and that you have lots of happy Sanibel memories to help you through the winter! :) Thanks again for my nutmegs!
Back in Memphis where it is windy and cold.
Happy to hear of your boring turret snail find.
Have a safe trip back home.
I can see it now– Next year in the Captiva Christmas Parade, beach bling will be pulling Santa’s sleigh! On Seahorse and Seahare! On Sea Pork and Sea Cucumber! On Sea Fan and Sea Whip! Dash away! Dash Away All!
Oh Linda! That is adorable!!!! LoL. Hmmmm and a great idea. Heehee. Thanks for the laugh honey!
Pam, a talented artist like you can perhaps make Sea Pork adorable but I think a team of Sea Horses or Sea Turtles would be more recognizable to the audience. And cuter with a red-nosed Rudolph leading them. Where would you put a red-nose on Sea Pork?
Love it!!!!! I might add splash away, splash away all.
What a wonder. I’m back in TN looking at mountains …pooh…missing our island home already!!! Have a great shelling month….I’ll be vicariously shelling with you, Pam.
So excited to arrive tomorrow for a glorious 2 1/2 weeks! I’ll keep my eyes peeled for one of these beauties!
It’s been snowing here in Steamboat Springs for 4 days with more to come. Thank goodness I have this to look at every day!!!
It’s so lovely here, in the low 80s, sunny, a sea breeze… really beautiful. I have been delighted with my haul of micros, and found a few nice medium-sized shells too. :) We are leaving on Friday. I would love to stay much longer, but I really can’t complain, 2 weeks is a nice long stay.
The seahorse is amazing…I have always wanted to find one but so far nothing even close. After reading about two years worth of blogs I don’t recall hearing about many seahorse being found on Sanibel. Can anyone tell me iif many are found on the island, and if there is a particular time of year when they might be washed up more? Thanks
Finding a seahorse on sanibel is very rare! I was thrilled that I found one this summer and another one about 8 years ago as well on Sanibel. Our friend Mary M. found one a few weeks after I found mine tis summer but I never got a chance to photograph it. Both were found around seaweed and seagrasses like Mimi’s.
Here are the only posts that I have shown Seahorses being found…http://www.iloveshelling.com/blog/category/seahorses/
Of course I don’t really know, but I would guess that a little sea horse sometimes gets washed up with the sea grasses that he lives on after a storm, a storm that rips out the sea grass roots and tosses up a whole bundle of grass and algae.
That sea grass and sea weed bundle at Gulfside was very high up on the beach, and was very extremely dried out. There were quite a few other bundles there too, but only one had a seahorse in it.
I suppose when exactly the right kind of storm comes though is anybody’s guess. Storms are the sheller’s friend, but their timing is pretty unpredictable! :)
This morning I found a “boring turret snail” shell at West Gulf Drive:
http://shellmuseum.org/shells/shelldetails.cfm?id=17
The one I found is in good shape, quite fresh.
It was not at all “boring” to find; it was very exciting, as I have never found that species before! Apparently it lives offshore. I seem to remember reading somewhere that it lives inside sponges, but I don’t really trust my memory on that.
Anyone else found one of these?
It’s definitely not a fossil Turritella washed out from the gravel in someone’s yard, it’s quite translucent and has some very pale tan-colored markings on it.
When I was sorting my adult fighting conchs down to just a few to take home, I realized that one of them has no spines at all on the shoulder, it’s just smooth. How common is that variant? Anyone know?
IMHO I wouldn’t call it “rare” because we have found quite a few that are knobless. I would call it uncommon though and a very good find. Do you have the book “The Sanibel Kaleidoscope”? It’s a great book by Harlan Wittkopt (I’d like to meet him one day) that shows many variations of the common shells.
Thanks Pam for the info.
I have not got that book and don’t know it. I will try to look it up.
Susan
The book doesn’t have a lot of different shells, but he covers many variations. Macintosh Books should have a copy or the other store on Periwinkle-Sanibel Island Bookstore. I just bought a compact LED magnifier with 7x magnification from a company called First Street(www.firststreetonline.com) It’s only $14.95 and it’s great for looking at minis. Good luck on your last few days.
Pat
Wow Pat, thanks so much for your reply! The LED magnifier sounds like a great thing to take on a trip! I will definitely look it up and almost certainly buy one.
Susan or anyone else interested. I looked up the magnifiers company and they have the magnifiers on sale now for $7.79! http://www.ultraoptix.com.
lighted magnifier #sv-2lpled. It’s nice and small. I’m bringing it to Sanibel in January.
Pat
How cute is Santa’s cap! IMHO I think the seahorse is just about the most fantastic creature there is. I’d probably start hyperventilating if I found one…. That and a junonia. which brings to mind – how do you pronounce Junonia? I’ve been phonetically saying junoiya all these years. wrong?
Greetings!! We were on Sanibel Island today. The fact that we found the island was purely an accident! We were just looking for a nice beach! We didn’t even know about shelling! Today was our second day shelling. My husband and nine year old son were wading and suddenly our son dove down and said what is that dad? ?? My husband said its just seaweed! My son persisted and lo and behold….a 7 inch seahorse!!!!!! We were so excited! ! What a find to bring home to Upper Michigan!!