Examine the “sand” of this beach. You will discover that it is not quartz grains—but mostly minute shell fragments. Entire shells of the warm-water molluscs that live offshore also wash up on the beach. There are also artifacts that speak of Indian activity in this area in past centuries, curled centers of conch shells from which the pre-Columbian Indians fashioned tools, and numerous pieces of pottery (potsherds). Both shells and potsherds tempt the collector. Shelling—that is, the collecting of _dead_ shells, for noncommercial purposes—is permitted. But Federal law prohibits the removal of even a fragment of pottery—for these are invaluable Indian relics, essential to continuing scientific investigation of the human history of the region. [Illustration: FLORIDA BAY AND THE COASTAL PRAIRIE (_elevation: sea level to 2 feet above sea level_)] FLORIDA BAY 1 RED-MANGROVE 2 BLACK-MANGROVE 3 WHITE-MANGROVE 4 BUTTONWOOD 5 CABBAGE PALMETTO 6 HURRICANE-KILLED BLACK-MANGROVES 7 FIG 8 POISONWOOD CROCODILE GREAT WHITE HERON REDDIS EGRET COCONUT PALM SUCCULENTS GRASSES SEDGES WATERWAY MARL PRAIRIE Back from the narrow beach is a drier zone of grasses and other low-growing vegetation. Some of the plants of this zone, such as the railroad vine, are so salt-tolerant that in places they grow almost to the water’s edge. (No plant that is extremely sensitive to salty soil could survive on Cape Sable.) Beyond the grassy zone is a zone of hardwoods (buttonwood, gumbo-limbo, Jamaica dogwood), cactuses, yucca, and other plants forming a transition from beach to coastal prairie. Birds provide much of the visual excitement of the beach community, just as they do in other parts of the park. Sandpipers, pelicans, gulls, egrets, ospreys, and bald eagles use it and the bordering waters for feeding, nesting, and resting. Mammals, notably raccoons, stalk the beach in search of food. And the big loggerhead turtle depends on it for nesting. In late spring and early summer the female loggerhead hauls herself up on the beach and digs a hole above hightide mark. There she deposits about 100 ping-pong balls—which should hatch out into baby loggerheads. Unfortunately for this marine reptile, however, most of them meet another fate. Hardly has the female turtle covered the eggs with sand and started back toward the water, than they are dug up and devoured by raccoons and other predators. These conditions created such high mortality of the turtles that the National Park Service has adopted special protective measures—removing some of the raccoons and erecting wire barriers around turtle nests. These measures have been effective, but continued surveillance is required if the loggerhead is not to disappear from Florida. [Illustration: THE FLAMINGO AREA]