Jim and Tim each found one of these beauties on Punta Salina, just across the way from San Evaristo. These Paper Nautilus' are very fragile and ours have remained in tact, thankfully, due to an empty cottage cheese container and entire package of cottonballs. We knew absolutely nothing about these doodads, so researched facts about them on the internet. They are an egg casing secreted from a female octopus-like creature called an 'argonaut'. The female remains in the shell guarding her eggs and hatched young until they are old enough to swim away and then the casing is discarded. Carolyne was in tears because she didn't find one on her own. Jim's attempt to drop his paper nautilus behind him in the sand so that she could make a 'discovery' of her own failed... she's getting too old for those tricks! Sigh.