A shell by any other name: Sanibel's best finds

We have written about the enticement of shells on Sanibel Island on other blog posts.

The diversity and abundance bring people here from far away places.

Sanibel is on the top tier of shelling destinations in the world.

But we want to drill down a little bit on this piece.

And certainly a closer look compels us to laud one of the tiniest shells on Sanibel.  The Angulate Wentletrap shell is a diminutive beauty.

It is so small that a child's outstretched  hand can (gently)  hold several Wentletraps with space between them. 

Once the home of sea snails, these beautiful spirals have a name of foreign origin.   The common name wentletraps is derived from the Dutch word wenteltrap, denoting a spiral staircase. This refers to the striking form and sculpture of the shells of the mollusks in this genus, and to a lesser extent, the whole family.

Because of their size, the wentletraps often go unnoticed and uncollected on shell abundant Sanibel. Every tide that hits Sanibel is like the upending of a treasure chest. In the morning, the blindingly white beaches of our island off Florida's Gulf coast twinkle with the bounty deposited overnight: a kaleidoscopic shimmer of seashells, in quantities that almost obscure the sand, in sizes from the too small to notice to the big enough to trip over, in such colors that you start to suspect mollusks, as a species, of being outrageous showoffs.

It's impossible to develop a comprehensive familiarity with this trove in just a few days, but you can learn enough to tell your wentletraps from your semeles, arks and cockles. But when on the beach and doing the Sanibel Stoop, you need to tread carefully, as many of these baubles have sharp spikes, and be even warier about picking things up, as quite a few of them are still inhabited by their original owners, or by hermit crabs, the squatters of the deep. There is manifold competition for Sanibel's daily jackpot. The beach is an all-you-can-eat buffet for assorted wader birds, and a motherlode for shell collectors.

After a few days on Sanibel, though, you can understand the single-mindedness of the shell collectors, and even their reasons for being up this early.

And we are willing to bet, the next time you want a memorable vacation you will be among the collectors.