Welcome to the Sanibel Captiva Shell Club
Our meeting location is:
Sanibel Recreation Center
Pelican Room and Osprey Room
3880 Sanibel Captiva Road,
Sanibel Island, Florida
Meeting Dates and Time:
Meetings are October through April on the second Sunday of the month with the exception of the October and March meetings which are on the third Sunday of the month.
(Our December meeting is a special “Members’ Only” event)
Meeting begins at 1:30 PM with a Silent Shell Auction, with the presentation starting at 2:00. The Zoom online portions begin at 2:00. The Oral Auction will take place after the presentation.
Hybrid Meetings
Our meetings are hybrid and open to the public. They are available on Zoom but only to club members. If you aren’t already a member of our club and you’d like to join, go to our Become a Member Page, click HERE, for more information on joining and some of the other benefits of becoming a member.
Meeting Activities
Our meeting activities vary, but most of our regular activities include a Live Auction with special shells chosen to bid on, a Silent Auction with a large assortment of shells and other related items, Show and Tell, and even book signings to name a few.
If you missed the line-up of speakers, you may find them by clicking here, HOME.
Aphidromus richardi
February 9, 2025 – Monthly Meeting/Lecture
Richard Goldberg
Richard and his wife Meg are recent residents to New Smyrna Beach, FL. He is the owner of “Worldwide Specimen Shells,” a mail order retail specimen shell business established in 1977. His interest in conchology dates to his youth. Shells and shell collecting has been part of his life ever since.
By profession, Richard is an award-winning television writer/producer/director of non-broadcast programming and molluscan sciences and malacology. He is very knowledgeable about non-marine or “land” shells. His interest and support of field work and research of the colorful and diverse land shell genus Amphidromus from Southeast Asia led to the discovery of a species then unknown to science. The land shell, Aphidromus richardi, is endemic to a small island in the eastern Indonesian Archipelago and is named for him. Other patronymic land and marine molluscan species have been described for him.
Richard travels extensively around the world in search of new and interesting shells for his shell business. He scuba dives for marine shells and is an avid hiker and outdoorsman in search of exotic land shells. His travels have taken him throughout the West Indies, the Mediterranean, Indonesia and, of course, the U.S. Since 1986 he has been studying the land shell of Jamaica and has been exploring the remote portions of the island for years. He is currently working on a book about Jamaican land shells based on his extensive field work in Jamaica.
Richard has actively participated in local, national, and international shell clubs. At 31 years old, Richard became the youngest President of the Conchologists of America, an international organization of shell collectors; this after being editor of their quarterly publication. He has also judged many competitive shell shows across the country and is an experienced appraiser of shell collections.
He has written dozens of popular articles about shells and shell collecting in conchological newsletters and journals published both here in the U.S. and overseas. His shell and nature photography has been published in several books and magazines, and film and video footage he shot of mollusks has been used on science television programs. He also wrote, produced, and directed the first television news magazine devoted solely to the hobby and science of conchology.
Richard actively promotes the hobby of shell collecting through talks and presentations given to shell clubs, museums, conferences, schools and even the Girl Scouts. One presentation given to a Brownie Troop led to the awarding of a “Mollusks” merit badge to all the girls who participated. The largest venue to talk about and promote shells and shell collecting came when he was invited to be a guest on the Martha Stewart Living television show in 2004. More recently Richard has worked again with the Martha Stewart producers, providing shells used in a segment dealing with Tiffany Pearls.
Now retired from the television world, Rich operates his shell business full time and is spending more time exploring the natural world that Florida has to offer.
Meeting Location and Time
Sanibel Rec Center
3880 Sanibel Captiva Road, Sanibel, FL
Doors open at 1:30 EST with a silent auction taking place in the Osprey room, while, in the Pelican Room, a “Meet and Greet” with members and guests will take place with light refreshments being offered. Don’t forget to get your raffle ticket as you enter.
Rich Goldberg’s presentation will begin shortly after a brief introduction at 2:00 EST in the Pelican Room. The Zoom portion of the meeting also begins at 2:00 EST. Club members will receive a Zoom link for the meeting by email, so you may join the meeting on Zoom if you are unable to attend in person. Not a member yet? Click on the Membership link to join.
Shell and Tell/Oral Auction
Do you have a beautiful shell or an unusual gift from the sea in your collection? We will have a “Shell and Tell” time during the meeting for anyone who would like to show off a treasure or two! Please bring it to the shell club meeting so we can see it and hear the story behind it! There will also be an Oral Auction of some special shells!
Please join us! Chat with others that share the same passion as you do. The public is always welcome to our meetings, which are free to attend! Thank you for being part of the Sanibel Shell Club! We hope to see you there! Happy shelling!
November 10, 2024 Monthly Meeting/Lecture – Click HERE to view presentation.
Kevan Sunderland
Kevan Sunderland will be presenting “One Hundred and Fifty Years of Discovery” on January 12, 2025. He will give us a look at the malacological discoveries from the 1820s through the 1960s including the vessels, crews, scientific equipment and shells discovered.
Kevan grew up in the Florida Keys where he became a shell collector at an early age. Even through high school, Kevan’s collection and documentation of shells of the Florida Keys was well recognized amongst his peers. His college years were spent in Key West where he had hundreds of shrimp boats, lobster boats and other commercial fisheries saving shells for him. By the time he graduated from Florida Atlantic University (FAU), with a degree in biology, he had already amassed one of the largest private collections of Caribbean shells.
Since then, through diving, dredging, netting, trapping, and continued work with many commercial fisheries around the Caribbean, his collection has grown into the largest private collection of Western Atlantic shells in the world.
Kevan has had numerous shells named after him that he discovered as new species from his night diving and deep-sea trawling around the Caribbean. His collection has been published in numerous shell books and scientific journals. Kevan is frequently invited to speak at the Conchologists of America Convention and at shell clubs. He has judged all of the major shell shows around the country multiple times.
November 10, 2024 Monthly Meeting/Lecture – Click HERE to view the presentation
Dr. José Leal, Science Director and Curator at the Bailey-Matthews National Shell Museum and Aquarium, will be sharing his presentation: Greater Than Ever Before: The New Great Hall of Shells at the Bailey-Matthews National Shell Museum and Aquarium. He will present an account of the work being done toward the renovation of the National Shell Museum’s main exhibits area. The new Great Hall of Shells will display thousands of specimens from all over the world, expanded exhibits of shells in human history and culture, and brand-new educational exhibits about conservation and the environment. With a unified and elegant design by Matter Practice of New York City, the project is the capstone of the Museum’s multi-year rebuild from the impact of Hurricane Ian. It will be one of the largest and finest exhibits of shells in the world!
Doors open at 1:30 EST with light refreshments being offered in the Pelican Room. The Silent Auction also takes place at this time in the Osprey Room. Dr. Leal’s presentation will begin shortly after a brief introduction at 2:00 EST in the Pelican Room. The Zoom portion of the meeting begins at 2:00 EST. Club members will receive a Zoom link for the meeting by email, so you may join the meeting on Zoom if you are unable to attend in person. Not a member yet? Click on the Membership Link to join.
October 20, 2024 Monthly Meeting/Lecture – Click HERE to view presentation
To kick off the season, our first meeting will feature Greg Curry, who will be presenting “Scaphella Junonia and Subspecies.” He will be bringing a collection of junonias for us to see after the presentation. Greg has more knowledge of junonias and has collected more junonias than just about anyone else that we know, so the Sanibel Shell Club is excited to have him share his expertise with us.
Greg was born and raised in the Florida Keys and has collected shells since he got his first shells off a shrimp boat at his father’s docks in 1955. He collected shells worldwide for a few years and then started focusing only on Volutes over forty-five years ago. In the past two years he has focused solely on the genus Scaphella because he sees the need to work on this distinctive group with its many unanswered questions.
Click for 2022/2023 Meeting and Lecturer Information