Fossil hunting

[user789653241]

I was wondering if anyone know good place for fossil hunting on south coast of England?
We've done quite a lot up north, but never been to south coast for fossil hunting.
Ds is 8 and would be happy just digging anything.

charmouth is good for jurassic, barton on sea for tiny eocene shells (beware it's digging in mud)
the iow is good.

Charmouth many happy hours spent there tap tapping in my youth

You could ring seven sisters country park near eastbourne, lots of chalk cliff locally, they might know? Or a natural history museum near the coast somewhere could probably tell you

Definitely Charmouth - otherwise further East, Rock A Nore near Hastings is good, but not quite as safe... has fish teeth, scales, crocodile teeth and so on. Always found plenty, but they're not as flashy as what you can get down on the Jurassic coast.

They have a very good centre on the beach at Charmouth where you can buy hammers etc and watch a video on what to look for and bash. The little rakes are handy. Tbh, you don't actually need a hammer down there - but take wellies/walking boots and some bin bags for putting them in afterwards in the car as the blue lias mud is evil stuff.

We went to Charmouth and had a great afternoon looking for fossils. We booked the tour in advance and the talk at the beginning of the tour was very helpful as we had no idea what to look for. Regret not taking a hammer, (and goggles) as the stone bashing looked fun! I suspect more fossils can be found at Lyme Regis though. We found a nice piece just by looking around at Lyme but at Charmouth tour with so many people hunting together it would be hard to be lucky!

Actually where are good places in the north for fossils hunting? I quite fancy doing it again!

Charmouth actually better than Lyme Regis - the town itself is gorgeous and well worth a visit though.

Best places to find fossils are either on the mud below Black Venn, or poke around in the sand between rocks - lots of little pyrite ammonites last time I was there and loads of belemnites.

You do need a geological hammer - not a normal B&Q job, although I have got chisels from B&Q... the ones with the safety plate to stop you whacking your fingers are quite good. Googles are an absolute must. They sell children's kits with small size hammers and googles.

Whitley Bay is very good.

Some of my best finds were from the Cotswolds - not really North though.

Kimmeridge Bay in Dorset is great as well.

Thank you everyone.
It sounds like Charmouth is the place to go this halfterm.
Ds has full fossil hunting kit.
Thank you for other suggestion as well, we will go there too, in the future.

IsayIdontknow, we've done lots of fossil hunting in Scotland, not actually north of England. Sorry! Waterloo and Brora were good find.

The isle of wight is pretty great for fossil collecting.

And not quite the south but south west england is probably the best place (that includes charmouth)

jurassiccoast.org/discover/things-to-do/fossil-hunting/

Herne Bay when it's very low tide.

Compton Bay on the Isle of Wight.

Thank you!
We have lots of places to go. How exciting!!!

Don't go under the base of the cliffs at Charmouth though, there are very regular rock falls.

You will find loads of fossils just on the sand once you get your eye in.

Thank you for info SisterViktorine.

We were planning to go on Thursday or Friday(today), but unfortunately ds has been ill.
Hopefully we can go tommorow or on Sunday...

Thank you for recommending Charmouth, we went there today and had a great day.
We found lots of belamite fossils, some plant(?), sea creatures, and great impression of ammonite today.
We found a quite big ammonite in the big rock, but nearly washed over by tide so we had to give up.(He bought ammonite from shop for souvenir.)

Ds was covered all over with mud and had a fantastic day.
We will definitely be going back there, and also planning to visit other places as well.
Thank you for great help, everyone!