Bill and all,

I am sure you are correct about Southernmost Point on Key West...we used
to vacation with a Navy couple back in the late 60's when almost the
whole eastern tip of the island of Key West was Navy and off limits to
us civvy shellers. (For those of you who have never visited there or
studied it on a map, it is a bit confusing, as compass points go, sort
of like Panama! You indeed go south (and west) to get to Key West, but
the island stretches from west to east...the farther you go onto the
island, the farther east you go.) My friend Skip (Carole Marshall and
Emilio P.,, do you remember Skip the Curmudgeon of early Conch-L days?)
lived in an off-base house just about four houses north of Southernmost
Point, so we spent a lot of time there back when! Skip always explained
that it wasn't really Southernmost Point at all, just Southermost
Accessible Point  for civilians. "The Point" is the place a few
fishermen and the Conch salesmen used to tie up their boats and peddle
their catch (Florida lobsters, shrimp, stone crabs, yellowtail, whatever
they had) and their painted coral and sawed-off conch horns. Big tourist
spot.  Today with the Navy having pulled out of a lot of that area, it
seems that the distinction is a hard one to understand.

Lynn
Louisville KY
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"William M. Frank" wrote:
>
> The so called "southern most point" in Key West is not that at all.  The
> actual southern most point was (is) the 6947th Electronic Security Sq.
> Antenna Field.  It extends hundreds of meters south of the so called
> southern most point -- but that is not popular with the local people as it
> has no monetary value.
>
> The area north of the so called southernmost point (pictured on some
> news casts) is a combination of live and dead substrate - mostly the latter.
> The most common species in this area is S. raninus, which can be found
> year-round, but are more common in the Mar.-Apr. breeding period.  I have
> shelled this area for many years - sometimes three times a day.
>
> I have seen the results of a major hurricane on Key West, and while S.
> raninus
> were thrown assunder (hey they are the most common inshore species), S.
> gigas were uncommon and only represended by "rollers" and were not common
> in the drift - maybe a half a dozen or so - even after a major hurricane.
>
> If the "rollers" are now so common, then maybe the S. gigas are in fact
> making a comback.
>
> Bill Frank
> 1865 Debutante Dr.
> Jacksonville, Florida 32246
> [log in to unmask]
> [log in to unmask]
> --------------------
> Visit the Jacksonville Shell Club Home Page
> http://home.sprynet.com/~wfrank/jacksonv.htm
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: <[log in to unmask]>
> To: <[log in to unmask]>
> Sent: Saturday, October 16, 1999 7:42 PM
> Subject: Re: Hurricane Irene & Conchs
>
> > As to that TV news report about the shells in Key West--yes, I saw the


> same
> > report Friday evening here in Clearwater.  And, much to my surprise, yes,
> the
> > shells were indeed Conchs--Strombus gigas juveniles or "Rollers" as many
> of
> > us refer to them.  The tourist (I believe he was), indicated that the
> shells
> > were found in the flooded street ( I believe near the famous southernmost
> > point).  He was holding 4 or 5 of them, but he indicated that he had
> picked
> > up nearly 100 that afternoon or something to that effect!!!!  I guess the
> > authorities were too busy with the storm to notice.  Some afternoon of
> > shelling!
> >
> > Carolyn Petrikin