UK FOSSILS | ECHINOID HUNTING | 2022 FIND MONTAGE | FOSSILEYES BRIGHTON

A little montage of finds from our first fossiling trip of 2022. Fossil hunting is definitely a fair weather sport - and we’re absolutely fine with that! We started Fossileyes to show those who are interested how they can do it for themselves. Some days, it’s harder to find them compared to others. But even if you don’t manage to find anything, you have still got yourself out on a beautiful day, and there’s always next time! The fossils we find down under the Peacehaven white cliffs are actually the internal flint moulds of fossilised sea urchins otherwise known as echinoids. These date back approximately to the late Cretaceous period (around 80 million years). The white part is the fossilised calcite shell of the urchin, which unfortunately often gets washed away after it pops out of the chalk and rolls around the beach. The best way to find these fossils is to look in the areas of the beach with stones of similar sizes (around 50-60mm) for stones that are grey in colour with unusual white markings. These markings are where the spines and protective plates would have been, and are slightly indented and filled with the last little bits of the calcite shell. The typical species found down just a short distance from Brighton’s famous beaches in Peacehaven are offaster (very small), conulus (coned), echinocorys, and micraster (heart shape). We also find some that we’re not sure about - so feel free to leave a comment if you spot something we haven’t listed!