Shell Feature: Olives

The glossy, smooth, marble-like olive shells have a distinctive oval-shape with a conical top. You can find a variety of sizes, with a maximum size of about 3.5 inches. The most common olive shells in Southwest Florida are the lettered olive, which are cream or tan colored with brownish v-shaped "lettering". I have also found all-cream colored shells, and recently a dark-gray colored one.

Scientific name of the lettered olive: Oliva sayana
Olives are predatory sea snails, a marine gastropod mollusk in the family Olivdae.
Coloring: tan, white, cream, brownish, gray
Size: up to 3.5 inches
Find lettered olives from North Carolina to Florida, Louisiana to Texas and south through the east coast of Mexico. It typically lives in near-shore waters, on shallow sand flats near inlets. The shells frequently wash ashore on Sanibel and Fort Myers Beach.

​-Melissa