{"id":2841,"date":"2014-03-12T21:49:49","date_gmt":"2014-03-12T21:49:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.sailpandora.com\/?p=2841"},"modified":"2014-03-12T21:49:49","modified_gmt":"2014-03-12T21:49:49","slug":"shells-i-love-finding-shells","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.sailpandora.com\/?p=2841","title":{"rendered":"Shells\u2026 I love finding shells"},"content":{"rendered":"

One of the things that Brenda and I really enjoy doing is shell hunting. \u00a0 It is just so pleasant to wander onto a new beach and wade through the shallow warm waters, to see what has washed up on the beach. \u00a0We have found, over the last two winters, that each beach has it’s own characteristics that make every day of shell hunting a unique experience.<\/p>\n

You’d think that shelling on the ocean side would be great but that’s actually not the case. \u00a0 It would seem logical that the surf would wash up shells. \u00a0However, we have found that on beaches with big surf that the shells are mostly broken up and those that you do find are quite damaged or worn down by the constant action of the waves. \u00a0As the surf rolls in and tumbles shells in the churning sand, what you find is pretty well worn. \u00a0Of course, one exception is sea glass, pieces of broken bottles that are worn smooth by the surf. \u00a0However, we actually find very little glass bits.<\/p>\n

The one thing that washes up in great quantities on the ocean side, however, is plastic trash. \u00a0It’s pretty depressing actually to see literally hundreds of plastic oil cans and other non-biodegradable items strewn along the beach. \u00a0In many areas, cruisers gather up the trash into piles which helps minimize the mess. \u00a0Unfortunately, any plastic that finds it’s way onto beaches will persist for dozens of years. \u00a0Even after a long time plastic bottles are still around even if they have become brittle from exposure to the sun. \u00a0Over time they become brittle from sunlight and break into tiny bits but they never really go away.<\/p>\n

It’s unfortunate that people are so casual in tossing things overboard. \u00a0Given the number of items that wash up on beaches here have writing in Spanish, I suspect that much of the trash floating around has probably come up from the Caribbean via the prevailing winds and the Gulf Stream. \u00a0 Someone told me that in Haiti trash is just pushed into the water where it floats away with the wind and current. \u00a0I don’t know if that’s accurate but it’s certainly not good to hear.<\/p>\n

Interestingly, you don’t find much trash on beaches that are west facing, away from the ocean here. \u00a0That suggests that the Bahamians and visitors are pretty good about not tossing garbage into the water. \u00a0That’s encouraging.<\/p>\n

Well, back to shelling. \u00a0No, you don’t find great shells often on the ocean side but on the west facing Bahamas Banks, the shelling can be quite good. \u00a0As the wave action is minimal those shells that wash ashore tend to be in quite good shape.<\/p>\n

The great variety of shells is amazing. \u00a0Interestingly though, you tend to find many shells of the same kind on any given beach with little variety at a particular location. \u00a0 In some spots sand dollars are very common and on others colorful “tellins”, which come on yellow, red and purple are everywhere. \u00a0These little “clams” are, not surprisingly, called “sunrise” tellins if they are yellow and “sunset” if they are purple. \u00a0This photo shows the shell diversity from one of our recent outings.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
\nWe particularly love the small or juvenile conch shells, the ones with the points on them, but finding them isn’t all that easy and most of the time they are alive, so we put them back. \u00a0This photo has a number of really nice little juvenile conch. \u00a0 We tend to find the little ones on exposed sandbars at low tide. \u00a0I suspect that these little guys wandered into shallow water and were exposed to the sun for too long at low tide. \u00a0The juvenile conch look similar to the adult but much more delicate. \u00a0When conch are about 1′ long they are harvested as a major food source here in the Bahamas.<\/span><\/p>\n

As I finish up this post it’s mid-morning\u00a0on Wednesday\u00a0and were are expecting the wind to increase a lot over the next 24 hours and swing around to the west for a bit as the cold front passes \u00a0through the area. \u00a0After the winds settle down, from forecasted speeds in the high 20s, we will head down to Staniel Cay, a short distance away, to pick up our new iPad and parts for the watermaker.<\/p>\n

After that, we hope to head south to Georgetown and our next opportunity for a “real” food market. \u00a0However, with one cold front after another coming through these days, we may have trouble finding a “weather window” long enough to make the 75 mile run south to Georgetown.<\/p>\n

Well, I guess I should be getting on with my day so I’ll sign off now.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

One of the things that Brenda and I really enjoy doing is shell hunting. \u00a0 It is just so pleasant to wander onto a new beach and wade through the shallow warm waters, to see what has washed up on the beach. \u00a0We have found, over the last two winters, that each beach has it’s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","_s2mail":"","site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2841","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sailpandora.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2841","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sailpandora.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sailpandora.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sailpandora.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sailpandora.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2841"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.sailpandora.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2841\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2843,"href":"https:\/\/www.sailpandora.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2841\/revisions\/2843"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sailpandora.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2841"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sailpandora.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2841"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sailpandora.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2841"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}