She Saves Shell Life by the Seashore

Plenty of people fret over the future of the wolf and the tiger. But who speaks out for the univalve and the bivalve? What about the marsh periwinkle? The banded tulip? The Florida fighting conch and the Atlantic moon snail? Who's willing to put themselves on the line for these mysterious little creatures of the murky brine?

Not many.

Scarlet Colley--"the shell lady"--does, though, down on Texas's South Padre Island. And when people don't care to hear what she has to say, her ultra-broad-shouldered husband, George, all six feet, seven inches of him, is standing right there behind her.

"It's sometimes a good thing," drawls one Texas Parks and Wildlife Department official, "that he's there, too." Scarlet's voice isn't loud--but it is insistent.

Down the Gulf Coast, at the supersalty mouth of the Rio Grande, Scarlet and George decided a few years ago to look for an eco-friendly way to earn a living on the water. Since the region's bird-watching ranks among North America's best, the couple soon got themselves a small pontoon boat with comfy seats for only a few clients and a galley as bright and spiffy as a housewife's kitchen. It was a far cry from the shrimpers' boat George had grown up on.

Next, quicker than the blink of an eye, the couple found themselves booked up by clients seeking a low-key, high-quality birding experience. Always out on the boat, Scarlet began to track the comings and goings of the local life forms. Visiting dolphins soon acquired names, compliments of her vivid imagination. Birds with permanent roosts became the couple's rather more distant but equally delightful acquaintances. From time to time, Scarlet would scoop up an injured animal--an endangered brown pelican covered with oil, for example--and carry it to the rehab center at the Gladys Porter Zoo, an hour's drive away, over the bridge and across the causeway, down to Brownsville.

The Colleys also came to know the people who used the bay for recreational and commercial fishing. But eventually Scarlet started to notice something that bothered her. Some of these folks came to the same spot every day with empty five-gallon buckets.

One day, Scarlet looked inside. "They were collecting live shells," Scarlet says. "Not just one or two, but scads at a time." Not being shy, Scarlet asked why one woman needed so many shells.

"I've been doing this for 10 years," the woman said, "and I know there is no law against it."

by Wendy Williams