Shelling on Sanibel Island

Do you remember as a child when you looked up at the sky it exploded with stars? The moon was so bright, you felt as though you could reach out and pluck it from the darkness? If you live out in the desert or in the country, you probably still experience this natural occurrence, but if you live in a large town or city, the sheer beauty of the night sky has probably been lost. That is unless you live in a town like Sanibel, Florida, where they take light pollution seriously.

According to the New Rules Project website, "Many of Florida's oceanfront communities have adopted lighting codes to protect the nesting sea turtles along beaches. Sea turtle hatchlings instinctively head toward light. Before electric lighting, bioluminescence and the reflection of the moon on the water made the ocean brighter than the land. But due to light pollution, hatchlings often head inland. The strict limits on street lighting on Sanibel Island aim to remedy the imbalance between the unnatural brightness of the shoreline and the natural bioluminescence of the sea."

The turtles are not the only ones reaping the rewards of these strict limits. On our recent trip to Sanibel Island, Kaybe and I had a plan that we would do a little night shelling during the low tide. We watched the sunset on one beach…

and then returned to our little cottage and headed down the path to the beach in the pitch dark. Kaybe's flashlight and my headlamp lighted our way…

Please note that this was the beach we stayed at and we knew there were no turtle nests in the area, otherwise we would not have been there with our lights.

One look up and you knew you were in the right place at the right time, the night sky was brilliant with stars and when we reached the water, the moonlight made a path to the sea…

Sorry for the shakiness of the moon, I didn't take my tripod with me. I was loaded down with my new shell shovel that Kaybe gave me when I got to her house and my shell bag.

So how did our night shelling expedition go, you ask? While we didn't find that many shells, we were well-rewarded with the sheer joy of being on the beach, away from the neon lights and noise you encounter on most beaches in Florida. Oh my dears, it was fantastic!

While nighttime, didn't reward us with a full bucket of shells, the daylight hours did!

Here's my haul from the first day…

And here's my haul from the second day…

Oh yeah, these beauties are going to clean up just fine.

I took these next two photos after I got home. They are of some of the minis I found.

Just look how tiny these five Horse Conchs are! I don't know how I spotted the one on the left, but I did!

The third day we were leaving the island and stopped on the causeway where I found these shell rocks. I just love these; they are formed when sediment from the ocean bottom and bits of shells bind together. Aren't they cool?

 I really love this one, with the imprint of a scallop shell clearly visible.

I found this as I was overturning some of those algae-covered rocks and shells you see in the background in this next photo…

It was here on the causeway that I finally found what I was searching for — a large piece of Horse Conch. I've written about these before, I consider them to be sculptures from the sea and this one will look gorgeous next to my black and white one you can see below if you missed it the first time.

Here's a couple of shots Kaybe took of me…

This stance has been dubbed the

Sanibel Stoop

and it is how you can tell the difference between the shellers and the sun-worshippers…

Here I am with my shell bag and

my new shell shovel

thanks again Kaybe!

This is what we see when we look down…

Click on this image to see it larger and you can pretend you were right there with us! Maybe next time, yes?

We shelled, shopped and ate for three days. When we started out, my brain looked like this…

By the time we left, it looked more like this…

My  brain on shells!

That's if for today, I have one more post to share with you about our Sanibel Adventure — The Shopping! I know you're all sittin' on the edge of your computer chairs waiting to hear why one shop proprietor was not happy to see us. Stay tuned…