She Spies Shells By the Seashore–identifying shells on a North Carolina beach

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It’s the last full day of beach week. Before I return my interesting assortment of shells and shell fragments to the shore (I really don’t need to bring them home, where they will sit ignored on a shelf), I try to identify them using two guides I have brought along.

The guides aren’t the only nature-related books I’ve brought–I also have a book on plants and one on the beach itself (How to Read a North Carolina Beach by Pilkey, Rice, and Neal). I’ve looked at plants before, though the only one I reliably remember is pennywort, with its peltate leaves like little umbrellas. (I had to look that up–“umbellate” is for flower clusters. Also, to be more specific, “beach pennywort” or Hydrocotyle, since pennywort is the name for a variety of plants.)

Back to the shells.

I didn’t reduce the size so you can zoom in for more detail.

The pretty gold and silvery bits turn out to be jingle shells (or parts thereof.) I recognize the coquinas from previous years of looking at my beach books. Slipper shells turn out to have a distinctive underside, and ark shells (turkey or otherwise) have a very straight hinge with little toothy marks on it.

But why do the turkey ark shells have those rune-like markings on the flat part? When I picked up the first one, I thought someone had etched those on–how interesting–but clearly they are natural. Some seem to have more than others. Are they a part of the shell, or a sign of something that attacked it?

The book about North Carolina beaches clears up one thing that has puzzled me–the black shells that look like other shells, only black. According to the book, those shells were once buried in the mud of a lagoon. In those low-oxygen conditions, “the iron in the shells turns into iron sulfide, which gives them their black color.” Islands migrate over time, and eventually the shells end up on a beach by the ocean. The take-away–they aren’t a different kind of shell, just colored by conditions.

The stripes and streaks and swirls of color lead me to pick up bits and pieces as well. I don’t try to identify them. I just appreciate the variety of color and texture.

Time to shut down this computer and sit on the deck, enjoying the view of dunes and sea. The waves are sparkling out there.

But first–speaking of sparkling, last night my daughter showed me something amazing. In parts of the beach, stomping through the wet sand caused tiny lights to appear. Some kind of bioluminescent creature in the water. I’d never seen it before, perhaps because I almost never go out on the beach after dark.

Till next post.

EDIT: An article in the Chapel Hill magazine mentions the White Baby’s Ear Moon Shell. I think the white shell I have labeled with a “?” in the photo fits the description. What serendipity, to find the shell listed in an article when I was just flipping through the magazine at random.

“I’m a little teapot, here’s my spout”–a close-up of a family teapot

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Above is a photo of the family teapot.

This is the teapot that traveled with my family since… I’m not sure when my parents bought it, but I’m currently sifting through family photos so possibly I will have a better answer later on. The steel part is a sort of tea cozy that fits over the plain white pot. No need to worry about the lid tipping off when you pour.

I love tea paraphernalia, and I have several teapots of my own. Some are inherited (silver with scallops, white with blue-and-gold); some were chosen (spring green, spring flowers). I like teapots with pretty designs or in appealing colors. I don’t like pots that are made to look like something else, such as a cake or a rabbit. That just isn’t my thing. I do like some teapots with simple, modern shapes, like this one. But there’s also one other important thing.

It has to pour well.

You’d think this would be required for any teapot, but I guess a lot of the really decorative teapots are bought by collectors and don’t get much use. (Mine don’t get much use, and I only have seven or eight! Imagine trying to use all of forty or so teapots!)

What makes a teapot pour well? I don’t know the answer. I do know that my parents’ teapot has a very unusual spout, and I can only assume it was meant to help it pour. I had never really looked at it, despite all those home-for-break teatimes, until now.

As you can see, there’s a small channel that runs down from the tip of the spout, and it is pierced.

And there’s a channel inside the spout that starts right at the hole. Is the drip meant to go back inside? Does this actually work? Did someone really do all this work to create a teapot that doesn’t drip? Surely this is more than is required.

I just looked up this company. It appears that other pouring vessels they made in the past, such as coffeepots, did have pierced spouts. I couldn’t find out if this was true of their current products. I would love to read more about this feature, how it compares to other spout shapes, and who came up with it. Maybe someone out there can point me to an article?

Till next tea-time–and next post.

Color and Shadow–more tricks of the light

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I guess it isn’t fair to call shadows a “trick” of the light. Perhaps it would be more accurate to describe them as creating shapes and colors on surfaces where those shapes and colors wouldn’t normally appear. Here I pair them with photos showing the difference that shadow and contrast can make to colors.

First, the shadows. I already have one post just on shadows, so you know I love the effect they can create, like a temporary mural with movement. Here are two more images that caught my eye.

A hanging plant casts a partial shadow above another plant.
The delicate shadows of a Japanese maple.

Now for the color trick. I was lying on the floor stretching my leg when I noticed that where the green living room paint touched the yellow paint of the kitchen, something strange happened.

Where’d this blue stripe come from?
The painted edge is definitely the same green paint.
It’s a trick of the light!

A while back, I read the book Joyful by Ingrid Fetell Lee, after having seen her TED talk. One of several things that struck me was something she said about joy being something that showed up in moments, like the delight on seeing an unexpected pop of color in a sea of blandness, or on suddenly hearing a cheerfully familiar tune, or being entranced by a really interesting painting. And further, that these moments significantly enrich our lives, which I really think they do.

And so it seems worth while to notice the interesting shadows around me, or the strange ways of color in light and shadow. Honestly, it’s probably better when you see these things pop up in your own life, rather than read about it in someone else’s blog. Photos just don’t capture it.

So really, the point of this post is probably “Take a second look at the things around you. Isn’t that an interesting shadow? Are there any color tricks around you now?”

One last thing, which I just noticed in the first photo and which may be due to the camera rather than a trick of the light at the time. Since when is my window frame pink? It’s white, contrasting nicely to the pale aqua wall in a paint called “Sparkle.”

Tricks.

Till next post.