Our Creative Space...

This week's Creative Space is quite exotic for many, now don't be jealous (he heee). You can see that we are both deeply concentrated with something...

The reason is that the shells are sooo tiny that you have to look very closely to even see them between the sand. If you walk on the beach you won't notice them and will think that they are tiny stones. These shells can only be found at one beach, a 1 hour drive from our home, a little paradise!

We are now busy with tiny glass bottles, filling them with these tiny shells and other sea treasures, the results will be soon available in the shop!

You can see more workspaces at Kootoyoo's blog!

All those shells are dead when we collect them between the grains of sand. The ones alive are upright 'glued' to the rocks. The dead ones are so tiny that is obvious they are babies that didn't make it in the waves.

That got me thinking that I know nothing about the reproductive system of shells. A net search discovered many fascinating facts.

Most shells are either male or female, but some are both, or change sex to accomodate to the situation. Sometimes eggs and sperm are tossed to the waves to find each other and sometimes the fertilization takes place internally.

Sometimes the shells die after reproducing and sometimes the female eats the partner's penis after the paring...a mollusk with an attitude.