Beach Bling, Another Day!

I said that I didn't pick up a lot yesterday, but I think I did pretty well! It's funny how every day there seems to be one thing that is easily found, today it was lightning whelks ....and paper figs. Paper figs are so fragile, but somehow they always show up when chaos hits the beach! Rarely do you find so many with such good color!

 I found a little bit of everything!

 This huge winged oyster was stuck in the middle of a pen shell...

 So ugly on the outside!

Of course I had to bring some of the bling home! :)

Sea Urchins, a Sea Whip and a sponge

And a couple of nearly perfect Millipede Sea Stars!

 Of course I can't resist the Scallop pairs.

 ...a pair of Sharks eyes

 and Gaudy Nautica

  

I got out to the beach a little earlier today, just in time to see another glorious sunrise, I will never grow tired of them, & they are never the same, but always beautiful!

The beach bling was there, but was different, this time it was mostly white shells...scattered among the pen shells

 ...with a few little strange creatures showing up here and there, like this batfish

 or this orange blobby thing, not sure what this is, but didn't investigate it too closely!

 This colorful blowfish, or blow toad they are sometimes called.

 This pink shrimp, as big as my hand!

Beautiful tulip egg cases, if you look closely, you can see some tiny tulips inside!

There were several areas where there were so many curly strings of these lightning whelk egg cases

and the horse conchs were still there, closer to the water, still alive in small groups

I found this beautiful 'teenager' bouncing around in the surf

This is my favorite size, and such beautiful color!

I had the perfect end to the day....finally an Alphabet Cone! It has been a long time since I have found one!

The adventure continues....

::Shelllady Hugs::

R & R and Beach Bling Galore!

Hubby and I finally got a chance to head South, just in time to miss another sleet, ice and snow storm! It's a little chilly here in the morning, but I can handle it! I didn't get organized as early as usual, but was able to catch the sunrise as I was on the paradise causeway.

Sanibel Lighthouse

I had been seeing posts from the beaches on Sanibel about all of the beach bling, shells....just amazing 'STUFF' on the beach, so I had to see for myself, and I was truly amazed!....and glad I was a little later, too much to see with just the aid of a flashlight!

It went on as far as you could see...

There was everything you could imagine...

Sea Stars...

Huge Sponges...

Sting rays....

even Sharks!...

Eels!...

Piles of shells, pen shells, fighting conchs, just about everything you could imagine...

A perfect empty pear whelk...he came home with me!!

The most amazing thing to me was the huge horse conchs, all over the beach, all live...

There were so many, you just quit checking to see if they were live. Several people were moving them into the gulf, some were really buried deep.  So many in fact, a person on one of our facebook groups is planning on bringing her boat to shore to carry them way out in the gulf, and was recruiting people to help! it was just amazing.  

Both sides of an awesome scallop!

Beautiful colors on this sea urchin

Look at this tiny little crab on this bright orange sea sponge...he was very much alive!

I was out for about  2-1/2 hours and didn't travel very far down the beach. I found a few special things, mostly just took pictures...too many to post! (This will be a two part post as a result!) Will post my finds tomorrow!!... Stay tuned!

::Shelllady Hugs::