A Miscellaneous Day of Shells

So today is a half day in school and tomorrow is my 17th birthday and on Sunday I have my Grande Finale show for horseback riding, so I'm very excited. But we all gotta get our shelling fix, so here goes! This post will be a compilation of various shell photos and topics. :D

I found this Northern Quahog in Southport, NC about five years ago. You can see the purple part on the inside of the shell, Native Americans carved beads from it.

This is a Purple Sea Fan, it is a soft coral. Soft corals are made up of colonies of teeny polyps. They do not need symbiotic algae to survive, like stony corals do, so they can live in deeper waters with less light. I found this Sea Fan in Fort Lauderdale, Florida.

I got this Sea Horse in a nature center in North Carolina. Sea Horses can change colors like chameleons and their eyes move separately on one another. Also, male Sea Horses have pouches under their stomachs where the females lay their eggs and then the male Sea Horse gives birth to the babies. :)

And in case you were wondering about the background in my two photos before, I want to show you my new bed spread. Yes it has shells!!!!!!!! 

Moving on to shellart. I drew this picture of a Sea Horse after seeing my Sea Horse (several photos above). Then I glued the picture into a frame and decorated it with seashells and coral. Hope you like it! 

Yesterday was a snow day, and as you guys know , I love playing in the snow with some shells. So here's a shell bow in the snow! What shells do you see and can you name?

Very kindly, one of my brothers agreed to be a hand model and hold some of my shells over the snow. Here's a close-up.

And here's the complete photo! It's just so cute!

Anyways, I hope that all you guys who are freezing in the snow, just like I am, enjoyed this post! Don't worry, spring is just around the corner.

By for now,

Lava of Ocean Dawn :D

Whelk Wednesday A Day Late

I have been wanting to do Whelk Wednesday for a week now, which for me is a very long time! ;) But, I didn't have time yesterday and I have time today (because we have a snow day here), so here is Whelk Wednesday, a day late!

There are several species of whelk that live on the Atlantic and Gulf Coasts of the US. I have specimens of four species in my collection

From left to right: Channeled Whelk, Knobbed Whelk, Pear Whelk and Lightning Whelk. Notice how the Lightning Whelk (the one on the very right) opens to the left instead of to the right as all the other shells do. This makes the Lightning Whelk a left-handed shell and all the others- right-handed shells.

This is the Lightning Whelk- if you hold it like shown in the right photo, with the aperture (opening) towards yourself and the spire (the top) pointing up, you will see that the aperture is on the left side of the shell. The Lightning Whelk is, I think, the only left-handed shell on this coast of the States. I found most of my Lightning Whelks on Sanibel Island, but they can be found as far North as North Carolina.

Now here is the Channeled Whelk, it is a right-handed shell because the aperture is on the right. I found this guy on Assateague Island, VA. It is common in shallow bays in southern England and was at one point used as food.

And here is a Knobbed Whelk. I found it on the same trip to Assateague Island that I found the Channeled Whelk above. These mollusks are also pretty common, and although they live in the north (New England and Mid-Atlantic) they can be found further down south in North Carolina and Florida because the long-shore currents tumble them down there

Lastly is the Pear Whelk. I have found all of my specimens of this shell on Sanibel Island. It can also  be known as the Fig Whelk. This species has been divided into 3 subspecies but I am not sure how to identify and separate them. So, just a fun fact.

All the whelk shells above are about the same size- 1.5 to 2.5 inches. However, the Lightning Whelk can grow to 15 inches, the Channeled Whelk to 7 in., the Knobbed Whelk to 8 in. and the Pear Whelk to 5 inches.

Lastly, here is a photo of all of my shell ID books. They are all helpful, but I use 'Florida Seashells: A Beachcomber's Guide" (top row, second from right) and "National Audubon Society Field Guide to North American Seashells" (middle of the bottom row) the most. :D

Have a wonderful day,

Yaroshelllava!!!!!

Valentine's Day and Shell Comparisons

Happy Valentine's Day everyone!!!!!!! I hope that everyone eats lots of chocolate, gets lots of flowers, hugs, teddy bears and balloons. In the mean while though, here is a heart from the shelling world:

 

 

Here is a heart made of False Angel Wings! I found a ton of these at Oak Island, NC in August of 2013. They were all over the beach!

 

Here's two of my bigger False Angel Wings. False Angel Wings can be found boring into waterlogged, rotting wood.

 

Here's a close-up. And yes, this shell is resembles members of the Angel Wing family, but it itself is not in that family.

 

And here's a picture of two of my Angel Wings. These shells are a well-known collector's items (obviously :D- they are sooo beautiful!). They are common on the West Coast of Florida where they can often be found burrowing in as deep as 2 feet of mud. They are also edible and used to be sold in markets throughout Cuba!

 

Here's a close-up of the Angel Wing. Angel wings live with most of their bodies outside of their shells.

 

And here is a comparison between the Angel Wing ( left) and False Angel Wing (right). As you can see, the first difference is their size- the Angel Wing is much bigger.

 

Here's another close-up. While the False Angel Wing has slightly raised, continuous ridges on its shell, the true Angel Wing has lines of raised knobs along its shell. Also, if you look closely at the bottom of both shells, you can see that the Angel Wing has several fold-like creases that flare out.

 

And another comparison that I wanted to show you is the Disk versus the Elegant Dosinia. Here are two specimens of the Disk Dosinia. This species is apparently not found living on open beaches, but only in bays or estuaries where it burrows in lose sand.

 

And here is the Elegant Dosinia.

 

Dosinias have very strong hinge ligaments that prevent the two shells of the bivalve from falling apart- you can find attached Dosinia shells all over the beaches, especially on Sanibel.

 

And here is the Disk Dosinia (on top) and the Elegant Dosinia (on the bottom). Despite the size difference, don't be fooled. The shells reach about the same size when adults, the specimens I have are just different ages probably.

 

And here's another picture. I know that it's a bit hard to see. But the Elegant Dosinia (on the bottom) has raised concentric ridges on its shell, while the Disk Dosinia (top) has a flatter shell with less pronounced ridges. Check the above photos of the individual shells, and the ridges should be easier to see. However, if you can't see it, don't be upset, I only realized how different the two shells were after I went through my collection and compared all the shells.

 

I gotta go now, but I hope that you learned a bunch from today's post. I know that I sure do, when I start researching shell!

Yaroshelllava :D

 

1st Anniversary!!!!

It has been exactly a year since I started this blog!
I shared pictures of my shell and fossil collection, pieces of shellart that I created and photos from my trips to various beaches. Thank you to all of you who have stuck with me through this year.
I just want to share some more photos with you to commemorate this anniversary!

 

Here is a photo of my seashell anchor which I made a few weeks ago. I gave it to my little brother because he really liked it. Hopefully he will start collecting seashells too, soon!

By bits and pieces of the Florida Crown Conch. I have never found a fully complete one- even the two on the bottom which look fairly whole, actually have holes in their sides. Oh well, in less than two months I'm gonna be on Sanibel and I hope that I'll find one!

 

 

The Atlantic Marginella... I found over a hundred of these mini shells (they are less than half an inch long) on our week long trip to Oak Island this summer.

 

And that's it for right now! Hopefully, I will have another post ready soon- either about some more of my shellart or a few shells that I identified recently. Keep tight!

 

Lava of Ocean Dawn :D