One of the things I wanted to do whilst staying in Yorkshire was go fossil hunting. We managed to go when we went over to Filey but it was on one of the hottest days of the year. We didn’t get to have very long down on the beach because it was just too hot but we did have a nice walk along the beach and I got to do a little bit of fossil hunting.
When we arrived we parked up and followed a trail down to the beach, it was too far but it was down a large hill and that meant we had to climb back up at the end of our fossil hunting session!
I love sharing my hobbies with other people and taking my family along fossil hunting was lovely, my mum found a few pieces of ammonites and I managed to find some ammonites but my favourite was a small stack of crinoid fossils, I had wanted to find some of these and was very happy when I did.
I cannot wait to go fossil hunting again in the future, it is one of my favourite activities as I get to spend time on the beach as well as find cool things!
I love going fossil hunting. It is one of my favourite things to do. Michael and I headed over to search for fossils at Walton on the naze and we were looking for shark teeth, vertebrae and ray plates to name a few.
Summer is not the best season for fossil hunting, but we still wanted to go. We normally go in winter as the storms erode the cliffs which mean there are more fossils to find.
This time around we found some shark teeth as we sat for hours going through the shingle. I love it when other people randomly find shark teeth right in front of us, especially when they are least expecting it. It is so lovely to see.
I am hoping to go fossil hunting a bit more and find a few more things. I am looking forwards to going to Yorkshire and am hoping to find some more ammonites, belemnites and crinoid fossils over there.
As well as finding lots of cool fossils we treated ourselves to a nice ice cream and we got a drink in the cafe. Michael had his camera with him, and a very kind (fellow) birdwatcher told us about some kestrels that were fledging from their nest on the tower. We ended up spending lots of time watching the juvenile kestrels as they tried to either get back to mum in the nest or find a perch and pluck up the courage to head out into the big wide world. Either way we got some nice photos and made some wonderful memories.
Fossil hunting is best done in the winter and there has been so many other things going on that we hadn’t had any time to get out and go.
Me and Michael we attending a funeral and we were chatting with my cousins and it came about that they also wanted to go fossil hunting so we arranged a trip on the 31st December 2021.
We headed over to Walton-On-The-Naze as there are facilities there and it makes me feel more comfortable especially if we have spent a chilly day on the beach but luckily the weather stayed clear and dry with a little bit of sunshine to light up our finds.
As soon as we arrived onto the beach me and Michael headed one way whilst my cousins headed in the opposite directions looking under the rocks. I stuck to the shingle and almost immediately found a nice took.
We walked all along the beach looking through shingle piles and in the London clay and eventually we had a nice little haul.
I had collected sharks teeth, shells and sea glass and everything in between.
It was such a busy day at the beach that the walk back to the car only revealed one sharks tooth, luckily it was the biggest and nicest find of the day but the rest of the beach had been pillaged and ruined by footprints and dogs digging holes here and then.
the sun was starting to set so we called it quits but we had a good day out and hope to return soon!
Thanks for reading, let me know if you have been fossil hunting and found anything cool!
It’s no secret that me and my boyfriend love to go to the beach and do cool things and I’m sure if you have been following my blog for a while you will know that we regularly go fossil hunting. We have found many different places to go fossil hunting in Essex and Kent but Harwich is one of the places we have been most successful.
We decided to take a trip down there on a wet and windy day when the tide was on its way out. We weren’t having much luck at first and the rain was dampening our spirits but we kept going knowing we had found some fossilised sharks teeth here before.
The best way to find the sharks teeth is to crouch down close to the ground and scan the beach. the best place to find the shark teeth (or whatever you are beachcombing for) is in the shingle. Smaller teeth get caught up in the smaller shingle and larger teeth can be found in the larger shingle/stony areas.
Our persistence paid off, once the tide had receded the shingle became more visible and the teeth started to appear. I found 26 teeth and two that are just the point but I am really happy with my haul.
Michael was also able to find some teeth which always makes me happy, he found six but I did give him one as he hadn’t found any and I had found about three.
we were there for about 2 and a half hours before we headed back to the car just in time as the heavens soon opened and it absolutely poured it down with rain.
When we got home we washed and dried our finds and have put them safely with our fossil collection.
If you go fossil hunting, remember to always check and watch the tides and you can quickly become cut off in some areas.
I have really been into my fossil hunting lately and me and my boyfriend decided to head over to the isle of Sheppey in Kent and see if we could find anything in the London clay there.
We decided to check out a place called warden and it did not disappoint.
We had only been on the beach for about 20 minutes when I found my first sharks’ tooth. Although warden offers a variety of different fossils from sharks’ teeth to fossilized crabs, we only found a few sharks teeth, some pyritized shells and I found a vertebra in Michael’s footstep.
We met some nice people on the beach and had a chat with a nice lady and her husband. She was very excited about the fossils I had found and went on the hunt for her own.
Now, we have a rule when we are fossil hunting, finders’ keepers and I get very attached to the fossils that I do find. But as I was making my way back down the beach, I stopped to look in the shingle, but it was a sign as I found a rather nice sharks tooth sitting in front of the nice lady’s husband, so I tentatively gave it to him for her and he was delighted.
Michael had a nap on the beach whilst I kept looking so he only found about 4 sharks teeth but he was happy with them and I was happy he had found some.
The beach itself was a nice shingly beach, full of modern shells and sea glass as well as cool pebbles and of course fossils. I collected a lot of sea glass including some amazing blue pieces which have joined my collection of blue sea glass in some tiny specimen jars, in fact so have my shark teeth.
I just love being at the beach and hope we can get out fossil hunting again soon.
I had been watching some fossil hunting videos on youtube, watching people from the UK fossil hunting close to home as well as watching some people in the US fossil hunting getting some tips and tricks.
I have also recently joined some fossil hunting groups on Facebook as well as beach combing groups and I was starting to miss the beach so much.
One video I watched was how successful someone’s fossil hunt had been when they went shark tooth hunting at Harwich. It is just across the water from our usual fossil hunting spots at Walton-On-The-Naze and I had arranged to head over there.
We had a lot of success for our selves as well, there was parking right on the side of the beach so we paid (using an app) and away we went, within 5 minutes I shouted that I had found one and a minute later I found another one.
Michael got tired pretty quickly but I kept going and I ended up finding 15 whole shark teeth which all range in size and I found about 8 broken teeth or tooth fragments.
There was one tooth I found which is actually the largest shark tooth in my collection and it has a funny story as Michael stopped right in front of it and bent down to pick up an oyster shell and I saw the tooth and picked it up, he was so disappointed that he had missed it but I thought it was hilarious.
Overall we had an amazing day and an amazing trip, the weather was absolutely beautiful and we spent a good 3 hours on the beach but we decided to stop for some lunch and it decided to pour down so we called it a day and headed home.
What an amazing haul we got though, I hope we get to go back soon,
Since starting this post as a draft back in September I have been fossil hunting twice.
It is always so lovely to be able to go. The first time was better as I was staying with my boyfriend so we could go together in the same can and the second time due to England’s lockdown restrictions we had to go in separate cars and meet there.
In September we was very lucky and had some lovely weather but it was so nice that the beach was really busy and filled with children and families all looking for fossils. We didn’t actually find much on this fossil hunt mostly crabs claws and pretty shells but as we were leaving I did find a nice fossilised sharks tooth.
The next time we went was in October half term, it was freezing! The tide wasn’t even out yet when we got there so we climbed down the boulders and onto the beach, a few people followed us after that but most waited to use the stairs. As soon as we got down onto the beach I found a vertebrae which I gave to Michael as I had found a vertebrae previously and he had called dibs on the next one. I was a bit sad that I have to give it up but by the end of the fossil hunt I had found 4 vertebrae’s for myself, 2 sharks teeth and a cool shell with fossilised worms in it.
We had a lovely time and even though the beach was much busier than we thought we would be, we did manage to find a good amount of fossils,
These are some of my previous finds with the ammonite fragment being found at Charmouth in Dorset.
After spending a day travelling I can finally say I am at the Jurassic coast. Yesterday we stopped at a national trust house called Kingston Lacy, the house wasnt actually open but we managed to go for a three mile walk around their grounds and through the forest which was incredible.
We were noticing things we wouldn’t normally like snails and wild flowers, we got to once place and we could just smell wild garlic.
This morning, Saturday 11th we had a lazy morning, we all got up late after nearly a full day of driving and we slowly had breakfast and got ready to go out. We wanted to go for a walk to the shops because we wanted to find somewhere we could book to have a Sunday dinner. we found a cute little pub and booked out slot at the Georges inn, I waited outside but apparently it is very old worldy inside but I will add some pictures later.
We walked around further to the shops found a co-op and some charity shops so we had a look and then realised we could loop around back to the cottage where we are staying.
We followed the road and managed to find Tesco’s superstore, we walked past knowing we now knew where it was and found a footpath which lead us directly back to the cottage.
We are staying on the Isle of Portland and its quite small, after we had some lunch back at the cottage we had been told about a footpath along the cliffs so we put our hiking boots back on and went to fin the path.
We ended up walking all the way to Portland bill which is 1 3/4 from where we joined the coast path. It was a lovely walk right next to the cliffs overlooking the sea.
Portland bill is the very tip of the island and there is a beautiful lighthouse stood tall.
Portland Bill lighthouse
It is also a great place for fossil hunting!
Due to walking we couldn’t pick much up but we did find some cool rocks with shells and impressions of them we even found an impression of an ammonite.
Ammonite impression, believed to be Titanites giganteus
As a zoologist all this fascinates me, my partner is more into palaeontology than me though, I still prefer the living creatures which is why along the coast path i chased butterflies and when we got to Portland Bill i got overly excited to see a wild raven.
This is very exciting as I have worked on a farm which had a raven called Loki, he was fascinating to work with, so intelligent. I have seen wild ravens before and this is at Newburgh forest on Anglesey, North Wales.
Well, here’s to a week of good food, good company long walks, wildlife, paddle boarding and FOSSIL HUNTING!
Megan's Adventures. 