It's Been Awhile . . .

I'm still here, beach-combing on a weekly basis . . . this morning hubby and I had some beach therapy, he mainly sat in a beach chair and chilled, I did my usual stroll & shell collecting. We made it for a lovely sunrise and a major surprise . . .

Ta da! This big gem was mostly buried in sand muck, a few inches underwater, between a sand bar that appears at low tide, and the actual beach. I saw the striking, unusual black/white pattern and dug up this, my first Florida horse conch! The shell is 11" long; they can reach 19" max.

On Monday, I found this nice knobbed whelk. Not my first, but they aren't easy to find so I was still pretty thrilled.

Now that the weather's cooled down a bit, beach-combing is quite pleasant all around.

Beach-combing Bonanza

Despite the threatening weather, Beach Therapy on this past Friday was really, really good . . . look closely, there's the juvenile reddish egret wading in the foreground . . . look very closely, you can see a flock of brown pelicans heading north just below the horizon (on the left) . . .

It's always thrilling to find a whole whelk shell . . . this small (1.75") Lightning Whelk has very strong dark brown markings . . .

This is the first whole (double-shelled) Atlantic cockle I've ever found; it's small, but it was still an exciting find!

I do have, somewhere in my shoe box sized pile of "misc. clam shells", another one of these Lightning Venus clam shells, but I don't believe the markings are this distinct.

I found two pieces of aqua sea glass; this was the larger piece, approx. 1.25" wide.

Another first  ~  a Jujube Topsnail !

Not a first, but a second . . . a very small Thick-lipped Drill . . .

It was a very good day for finding whelk pieces . . .  my shell bag runneth over!

A Heron Beach Bum

This would've been much better with a SLR camera . . . there were several types of shore birds at my "winter" beach Thurs., which I hadn't visited in many weeks . . . besides this great blue heron, there were royal terns, willets, sandpipers (I believe), sanderlings, and more. That vegetation in the background with the pointed fan shaped fronds is called saw palmetto. It's extremely common, all over Florida. After living here almost 4 years now, I'm not entirely used to it yet!

Another sunrise over the Atlantic; the dark cloud is a thunderhead . . .

At NP Beach, I found 3 sand dollars . . . all good-sized and whole.

Railroad vine (morning glory) is named so due to the very long strands that grow running out onto the beach, vs. climbing. There is also beach morning glory, which is white, growing on the beach dunes right now. I use the term "dunes" loosely; the sand mounds here are nothing like the ones on the Pacific NW coast where I grew up.

Golden Sunrise

This is definitely a favorite sunrise shot so far . . . !  I made it to the beach on Tues., after about 10 days without any beach therapy . . . the sunrise alone was well worth the early rise. But I'm happy that the sunrise time is becoming later in the day!

This was a small, but exciting find . . . just shy of 2 inches long, a whole, channeled whelk . . .
it cleaned up easily.

And this pear whelk, about 1.5 inches long . . .

Not sure why, but I love finding jingle shells . . . this was a large, black one.

Sunrise and Spotted Horsemint

Sunrise on Friday . . . much needed beach therapy after 1 ½ weeks without . . .

. . . This was sunrise last week . . . a lone jogger . . .

. . . The same sunrise from last week, with low tide sandbar and pool . . .

One of the pools held this mullet fingerling . . .

A whole, but battered, whelk shell after I pulled it from the sand . . .

. . . A whelk piece in the shell hash . . . I never tire of finding these.

A large jingle . . . a bi-valve . . . though I've never found a complete one with both shells . . .

I've wanted a photo of this wildflower for some time . . . this is growing by the dunes/roadside along A1A . . . spotted horsemint, a native Florida wildflower ,  I'm happy to say! It doesn't smell like mint, however. It can be used for a "weak" tea, but ingesting the plant itself, is poisonous.

A Bird's-Eye View . . .

Who doesn't love wading in the salty water, watching the waves roll in . . . I'm pretty sure this was an immature reddish egret .

An osprey discovered the perch I've also seen a bald eagle atop in weeks past . . . on the Intracoastal side of Matanzas Inlet . . .

. . . It was a dark and stormy morning . . .

Not many seashell finds, but this scallop was the most strongly patterned one I've found on this particular beach.

A Semele Sunrise

Looks like I'm only getting beach therapy one day this week . . .

Another red sunrise on Tuesday . . .

Some shells, esp. some bivalves, are hard to ID but I'm pretty sure this is a (not-so)-White Atlantic Semele.  It just happens to have some discoloration due to being buried.

This tiny almost-whole gastropod shell is a thick-lipped drill. Their max. size is 1.5 in.

Another nice shark's eye was found, sitting in some shell hash . . .

And I found a good-sized Atlantic calico scallop, along with a few smaller ones.

Seeing Red

It wasn't my best couple hours of beach therapy this morning, but nice all the same, and full of reds . . .

. . . Like the sunrise . . . in an otherwise dark horizon . . . it didn't seem this sinister in real life!

I found another calico scallop with an acorn barnacle attached . . .

On the Intracoastal Waterway side, this reddish egret flew in and landed out in the shallows . . . This is the first reddish egret I've seen since living in NE Florida 3 years . . . too bad I didn't have my SLR camera with me . . .

Another shapely piece of a whelk shell . . . even though I'd prefer to find a whole whelk, the curly pieces definitely have their own unique beauty.

Willets, Whorls and a Wentletrap

Another two days of beach therapy this week . . . sunrise on Thurs. was simple but lovely . . .

…One of two whelk whorls found Thurs.; the other is white . . .
(The spiral end of the gastropod shells are called whorls)

I found this wentletrap on my way back up the beach, where many people had already passed by . . . my first wentletrap! The shell only reaches 1" long, the length of this one.

…Short razor clam shells (stout tagelus) aren't common and when I find them they're usually broken...

Both visits to the beach this week had me finding a lot of whelk "bones" . . .

The partridge pea, a dune plant, is in bloom now.

Coral and a Touch of Cobalt

I enjoyed a couple more trips to the beach this week…good thing I go in the morning, because the 3 pm summer showers are hitting like clockwork these days…

I'm starting to find several disc dosinia shells each visit…but so far this is the only rusty colored one I've found…the rust color is from prolonged exposure to the air...

The sunrise on Mon. wasn't overly "fancy" but they're still always impressive to see…

This is the largest piece of coral I've found so far…it's approx. 1 1/2" wide, and it's Northern cup coral.

A heart from nature…a well worn piece of shell...

Cobalt blue sea glass is supposed to be "rare" (red, orange, and yellow are "very rare")…

this piece is small (½" wide), but I was thrilled all the same!

I find a few whelk "bones" -- as I call them -- usually, but only 1-2 have a more lovely, graceful shape overall...

…On the inlet side of the beach, a lone snowy egret seemed to be meditating…

While nearby, this large, battered knobbed whelk "bone" silently rested its weary soul.