Guide
Ding Darling Refuge: A Visitor's Guide to Wildlife Drive
Featured
Four miles of one-way road through 6,400 acres of mangrove. It is closed on Fridays, and the tide decides whether you see anything.
8 min read
Caleb Nystrom
Nature & Shelling Editor
Beat: Nature & Wildlife, Beaches, Birding
Caleb reads this island by tide chart and moon phase and has been shelling its beaches since before the causeway was rebuilt. He writes the refuge, the birds and the shell beds, and he is unbending about the live-collection ban: if there is an animal inside it, it goes back in the water. He would rather you found one good shell legally than a bucket of trouble.
3 guides · 3 news posts
Last updatedCaleb's most recent update to this site was .
Long-form
Guides by Caleb Nystrom
Reported guides to Sanibel, each with its own publication and last-updated date.
Guide
Birding on Sanibel: Where, When and What
More than 245 species have been recorded at the refuge alone. The trick is not where to stand — it is when, and the answer is a falling tide.
7 min read
Guide
Shelling on Sanibel: The Complete Guide
FeaturedThe island lies broadside to the Gulf and works like a scoop. Learn the tide, learn the law, and learn to tell a live sand dollar from a dead one.
11 min read
News desk
News under Caleb Nystrom's byline
Shorter, dated pieces about what is changing in Sanibel.
How this was written. News published under Caleb Nystrom's byline was drafted by machine from primary sources — operator notices, government and municipal releases, published schedules — and every factual claim in it was matched to one of those sources before it published. A Sanibel Guide editor can change or pull any of it. Our editorial standards.
Travel alert
The Refuge Shuts on Fridays, and It Catches Somebody Out Every Week
FeaturedOne day a week the gate at the most visited place on Sanibel does not open. Plan your Friday around it rather than discovering it from the car park.
Travel alert
The Live-Shell Ban Is Thirty Years Old, and the Island Fought for It
FeaturedSand dollars and sea stars are covered too. A first offence carries a fine of up to $500. Here is how the rule came about and how to stay the right side of it.
Seasonal
Why the Morning After a Cold Front Is the Best Shelling of the Year
FeaturedFour variables decide whether a morning on the tide line is ordinary or the reason people move here. Two of them are published; two you watch the sky for.