March Moments

I realize I haven't posted since last Nov., so once again I'm playing a bit of catch-up with my sharing. I was out of state mid-Nov. through late Jan., have very few photos from Feb., so I'm jumping to March . . .

Sunrise on March 2nd . . . I didn't find hardly a thing but a pretty sunrise on this visit! It was chilly and pretty windy.

Well, I did find this nice whelk piece.

Sunrise and a lot of beach birds at low tide, March 14th . . .

A cannonball jellyfish, one of many that washed ashore due to a "bloom".

A shark eye ~ along with my other "usual" shell finds, they're becoming much less common finds.

Two calico scallops, found close to each other.

Barnacle cluster

Now this is a rare find ~ an imperial venus clam.

An angelwing, one of four types found in Florida. I find three of the four; have never found a fallen-angelwing.

I couldn't help but smile at this frisbee, even if it is beach trash.

Heading back north to my car, following a frothy trail of sea foam.

March 26th almost sunrise . . .

Following a trail of beached cannonball jellyfish . . .

Another heart-shaped shell piece for my collection . . . harder to find than you'd think!

Sunrise . . .

I always enjoy finding a lightning venus clam shell, not only because they're fairly uncommon but I really like their design.

Another calico scallop . . .

I do still find whelk "curly cue" pieces fairly often.

A lone willet and pretty sand waves.

A false angelwing, much smaller than the angelwing.

The bald eagle is back this spring . . . this is the fourth year I've seen him/her at this post, on the Intracoastal Waterway side of the bridge over the inlet.

A nice piece of clear sea glass . . . common color but always a thrill to find.

Another curly-cue whelk piece, a nice larger one.

Halloween Hunting

Heading for the beach, in the dark, on Halloween Day, was a bit eerie, I admit! I time it so that I arrive about 20 min. before sunrise, so I can watch the sun rise over the Atlantic Ocean. It's about a 25 min. drive to my beach, so it's still dark when I leave the house . . .

There was a Halloween-colored sunrise . . .

A pretty decent lightning whelk . . .

A few clusters of Titan acorn barnacles . . .

A few shark eyes, as usual . . .

An unusually patterned calico scallop . . .

A few lettered olives, as usual . . .

A Salle's auger . . .

On the way back to my car, I took a moment to . . . Just. Breathe.

And driving back home, I finally made good on my long-standing threat to stop and take a photo of my favorite Floridian mailbox, which gets dressed up for holidays.  :)

Two First and Rare Finds

We were fortunate to be outside the path of Hurricane Michael; we only received some rain and wind, on and off for a couple days, nothing threatening. I hadn't been to "my" beach for several weeks, so it was wonderful to get some beach therapy Friday. And it was pretty exciting to find two firsts as well!

Right off, after hitting the beach, I found these two sand dollars . . .

Sunrise was really awesome!

This lightning whelk is a bit rough but I'm hoping it will clean up nicely.

Green is a common seaglass color, (wine bottles, etc.) but the size and shape of this piece is a real nice find.

An almost whole whelk, and one of 5-6 calico scallops I found . . .

First find #1 ~ An aqua bottle stopper! I doubt it's an antique, but thrilling all the same!

Now this was a shocker! Not only is it real rare to find a tulip shell, banded or true, on my beach, but a yellow one at that?! Very rare! This is a true tulip, more rare than the banded tulip. And the yellow is even more rare!

Two lettered olives . . . one golden. I found a few more olives, all small.

A couple more scallops . . .

A buttercup lucine . . .

A beach stone and a small shark eye (R) . . .

A nice, white common jingle

Another piece of sea glass ~ aqua is also common, as in Coke bottles, but this is a nice size like the dark green piece.

The Four S's

Finally, after three weeks I made it to the beach Wed., for some sand, sea, sun, and shells . . .
Same time as usual (arrived 20 min. before sunrise) . . .

A couple small lettered olives in the same spot . . .

A lightning venus (top) and an Atlantic rangia . . .

A very pretty, very unusually colored blood ark . . .

An understated sunrise . . .

More olives . . .

A southern surfclam . . .

False angelwing (there are four species of angelwings here in FL) . . .

A calico scallop . . .

View of Matanzas Inlet . . . this is a "vein" of the Matanzas River, which is part of the Intracoastal Waterway.

Another lightning venus . . . two in the same visit is quite rare!

Hard to ID this ark, does not look like any of the 10 species we have in FL . . . most close is the Incongruous ark but they're pretty common at this beach and do not typically look quite like this (shape).

A very pretty shark eye moonsnail, thanks to discoloration that is caused by a shell being buried in sediment for awhile (due to a lack of oxygen).

I passed this great blue heron on my way back north, and it started to follow me! I'm guessing it thought I might be dropping bait fish like an off-coast fisherman, but I was only dropping discarded shells.

A jingle (oyster half) on L, crossed barred venus below.

A cream-colored scallop . . .

A more typical calico scallop . . .

Shore birds . . . there were royal terns, sandwich terns, laughing gulls . . . but what caught my attention was a small flock of very small, very dark terns! They were very skittish; all but one flew off when I took this photo (they circled back). The third, small bird from the left is what I believe is a black tern! No other bird matches the description; note the very short legs.

Bad photo . . . there were several of the darker birds, very pretty in person, which turn out to be juvenile laughing gulls. The top left bird is an adult gull. The five white birds are royal terns.