'shrooms & fish....no delicacy for me!

The closest I could come to identifying this fungus [is it really a mushroom as the site says?]...would be to name it Dyard's Saddle. Tho it resembles a saddle somewhat, and closely marked as others listed in FLICKR images, I'm just not 100% positive. Heck, I'm not even 5% positive. But I wanted to give it a name, so ---at least I'll call it a tree fungus SADDLE!!! The site to ID fungus and mushroom growth on trees, is here...and it states that this is one of the earliest 'shrooms to evolve in the season [April thru August]. Maybe it is, maybe it isn't' cause these images were taken the last days of March, and things 'pop out' and grow earlier here than most anywhere else in the country. I sure as heck wouldn't see if it was edible!! I'll just take their word for it, and buy mine from the produce section. Pretty in a way, creepy in so many other ways. This was found near a turtle pond that has dried up and much dead wood is found below the boardwalk.





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MONDAY MORSELS


A few days ago, we walked the beaches. Going along, I was still in my shoes. As the surf came in, we both continued to walk our mile long trek one way. But when I turned around to head back, I couldn't resist taking off my shoes and get in the water. It was a hot day, the sun was beating down on my shoulder. I hadn't found but a couple of tiger eye snail shells and they were in my bag, wrapped around my wrist. I hooked it on my "D" hook off my cellphone, and began untying my shoes ---carrying them in my hand, I headed toward the water and was put into shock that the water was more cold than I expected. But, it still felt good to get wet, and curl my toes in the soft, wet sand. Walking back...of course I always seem to look DOWN, while Bud is looking out to the horizon. I'm watching my step for broken glass shards and the proverbial jellyfish washing ashore. Along the way, as the surf ebbed, on the residue of the wave and drenched sand, I spied several small [TINY] circular things. The center was glass like while the outer part was hairy and green slime. I was sure this was some type of sea creature!!! After a while, after seeing so many of them, I got the phone out of the case and took a picture of it so I could have me something to 'go by' in my Google research when back home. Downloading the photo from the phone to the computer, I then got out on Google and typed in "tiny green jellyfish". Not much to go on. And I found nothing that even came close. I typed in the only other creature that I could think of "tiny green anemone". All the photos shown for this result gave nothing in terms of helping me know what it was. I then went back and re-typed a search "tiny green jellyfish in the Gulf of Mexico"....I came up with a link to a PDF file from the National Seashore Nat'l Park here on the island. After opening it up...there it was!! Clear as snot on a tissue...THAT'S IT!! It's a Blue Button Jellyfish!!

Blue Button: Like the Portuguese man-of-war and By-the-wind
sailor, the Blue button is a colony of organisms that
drift at the mercy of the wind and currents. It is most
often a rich blue on top with tentacles that vary in
color from blue to a bright green. Sometimes the top
is a golden-brown color. The Blue button has a flat,
circular gas-filled chamber, which acts as a float. It
is surrounded by blue-green tentacles that are not
strong enough to harm humans. The tentacles are
actually individual zooids, organic cells that can move
independently within a living organism. Each zooid
has a specialized function: some digest, others capture
prey, and some zooids are specialized for reproduction.

info found here
Padre Island National Seashore

I'd heard of, and seen, the cabbagehead, the man of war, the by the wind [I have no photo of any I took] and the moon jelly. But this one is new for me!! By the way, the size is not nearly as big as a large concord grape; maybe a 'inth' smaller than the size of a USA dime.