Show Your Stripes (Colorful Moonsnail)
4" X 6"
Watercolor
$75
These shells remind me of the shark's eye shells that were so prevalent in the Panhandle during my childhood, most often with hermit crabs living in them. It turns out that they are in the same family biologically. I've never seen one with the snail still living in it, but apparently they can spread out to ten times the size of the shell and have a
similar coloration (as many gastropods do).
I have also seen a few milk moonsnails, but I rarely pick them up. I do love the stripes on the colorful variety, maybe it's the tiger fan in me (foreshadowing of days 5 and 6). The only shark's eye shells I have found here are bleached white on the Atlantic side of the island. I did find a sand collar on the Gulf side this week, so there must be some shark's eye snail around unless all these guys make them and they only mentioned it on the shark's eye entry of my book.
