Mary, Mary... how does your garden grow?

I have always had a fascination with sea shells.  I always come home from each of our walks with a pocket full of shells and of course the sand that goes with them.  I have found that each beach has its own species oo kind that you see the very most.  So, in the spirit of sharing I have some photos of the different shells and a bit of information to share.  Please pay attention.

These shells I found on Cheltenham Beach nearly two weeks ago.  They are very rough and all on the ourside but they are very smooth on the inside.  I am not sure what they are called but they are all over the place.  The bumps or ridges on the ourside are not sharp but rather smooth.  

This is an example of one that I picked up on Mirangi Beach.  It is two shells that are fused together .  If you turn this over it is just like this on side.  Not sure why they are connected.  These are smaller and are only about the sixe of quarters.  This was the most prevelant shell on that entire beach.  Interesting because I had not seen it before.  

These shells I picked on two different sides of the island.  The smaller ones I picked up on the east coast.  The small blue one I found mostly at Long Bay Beach and they were everywhere.  They are relatively flat with just a bit of rounding on the outside.  They are smooth and have some color on the inside but it is usually just one color, like blue and then white.   They are about the size of a silver dollar.  The bigger ones I found at Muriwai, which is the black sand beach on the west coast of the island.  They are rounded on the top and are about an inch thick.  On the one side they are almost straight and there is no curve to it at all.  They are similar to the smaller ones inside.  The two white ones on the right are almost the very same but the bigger one is very shinny and translucent.  Pretty.  The bigger ones are about the size of a tennis ball.  

These I also got on the west coast and you can see from them that they are very flat on the one side.  I thought maybe the shell needed to get bigger for that to happen but the smallest one here is the size of a quarter.  They are so fun to look at.  

In reference to the Mary, Mary....the garden grows with silver bells and cockle shells....these are cockle shells.  Now you know. (They are also called a pipi shell.)