My Charmouth Fossils

                                                          Charmouth Beach

Cold ,wet,wild and windy here in Mullion today , so I thought I.d have a sort through the bag of bits and pieces that I, d picked up on Charmouth Beach a couple of weeks ago.

Not much this time as you can see and some of it was so covered in thick shale mud , that I thought I,d just tip it all out and let the rain wash it off . Tiny ammonites pieces of belemnites, the bits of old terracotta pots ,which I gather and smash to go around my pots of cacti. ..a couple of ammonites in the harder shale , which I,ll give to my grandson .

Good to get him interested  .

.....and then I remembered seeing this sticking out of the mud flows about a third of the way up the beach in the top photo . I remember thinking " that looks like bone ". I tried to wash off the shale mud in the sea , but Shale mud is the thickest stickiest grey clay like mud....you dont want to step into it or you will be stuck fast ...which is why fossils are so well preserved here ....in another few thousand years  , people will come and find fossilized wellies and feet !
  So back home ,after two weeks of heavy rain the shale still has not washed off !
I had to scrape it off and then brush off the rest with an old nail brush ........
.....and ...do you know what ? !.......I think that it might just be bone !
 I have found lots of vertebrae here ichthyosaur and one huge plesiosaur vertebrae,  but this I will need some help in identifying .
   Very excited ! I will take it to the museum in Lyme Regis next time we are there....or maybe someone can identify it for me on here  ?

Charmouth Dinosaur Hunting

So we finally got away to Charmouth between the storms . In fact we had four dry and quite mild days .....and when the tide went out , we did some dinosaur hunting .
 We,ve been coming to Charmouth for many years , looking for fossils along the shore line.    We never bring geological hammers , there is no need !

Think small , you can find sweet tiny things lying in the shingle on the beach .
The sea has washed off all that grey sticky shale for you and you stay safe , well away from the mud flows and slipping crumbling cliffs .

                                         Heres a beautiful tiny piece of coral .

                                         
                                                         Ammonite .

 Very worn, sea rolled piece of rock with ammonites in , beautiful ....into my pocket it goes !

Beach combing is so therapeutic and back at base , I turn out my pockets !
      Now look at this !  This might be something special ....any ideas  ?
                  I am pretty sure it is bone ( fossilised ) .

Over the years , I have been lucky to find both Ichthyosaur and Pliesiosaur vertebrae  at Charmouth . Yes ! You will find them from time to time and they are easy to spot lying in amongst the shingle and cobbles on the beach . I decided that I would begin to train my eyes and brain to find other bones apart from vertebrae . So I,ve been doing alot of study and research .
 I think this might be an ankle bone , calcaneus ...and if it is then it will be from a land dinosaur .Scelidosaurus is the one that has been found in Charmouth .....and they have one in the  Charmouth museum and heritage centre ,which sadly , was closed while we were there ! : (        ( so were the loos ! )

 Anyway , here is another pic of my best find , have a look and please if you are an expert on fossil bones , then let me know what you think it might be ?
 I also want to stress , that this too , I found lying in the shingle , not far along the beach really  . I didn,t feel like walking all the way up to the Golden Cap this time !

The Charmouth Heritage Centre and Fossil Museum is brilliant ! Especially for children !
Here there is also a Fossil shop full of wonderful things , fossils, rocks , crystals ,Massive Ichthyosaur skeleton .There is a cafe too , but also , not open while we were there : (

Beautiful Charmouth

 

I loved this rock art that someone had made on the beach !

Charmouth Weekend Trip

 

 

 

Another brilliant fossil hunting trip to Charmouth . Many small pyrities ammonites and broken belemnites...my best finds this time are these two Ichthyosaur vertebrae and what I think may be a scute or scale from a crocodile . I also brought back one or two large pieces of shale, such as the one here ,to investigate further at home .

.....aah.....but ......

...........on the river walk .....I found this ! It,s fossil bone ...but I dont recognise which bone or what from.......plesiosaur ? Any ideas would be welcome , as it will be rather costly to send in the post to the Natural History Museum due to it's weight . ....and I am SO excited about it and cant wait that long !

Charmouth for Fossils !

The Golden Cap at Charmouth .
The pictures above are of the various Ammonites to be found here and three single Ichthyosaur vertebrae ....which my husband found all within one hour ! ....... he also found the four fused Ichthyosaur vertebrae ..... not fair ! hmph !