Fossils and Geology of Lydstep, SW Wales. Fossil Collecting & Geological Guides

Lydstep Headland Fossils and Fossil Collecting
Your SW Wales Geological Guide and Geology Info

Good quality coral fossils are abundant within the rocks at this beautiful little cove. Most cannot be collected however as they are found within the limestone cliffs and on the surfaces of large boulders.

Lydstep Headland - SW Wales
Last updated: [16/11/07] last visited 2007

Carboniferous

Written by Joe Shimmin

(Lydstep Headland, 2007)

Location Information

Coral fossils are everywhere - within the cliffs, on the surfaces of boulders, in pebbles and cobbles washed by the sea. It is very easy to find fossils here.

(Suitable for Children)

This location is suitable for children, but they should be well supervised as there are large boulders and rock overhangs.

It can be a little tricky to find the National Trust car park but once there, the walk is short, along a well maintained path to reach the cove. The descent down to the location should not prove too difficult for most. The cove itself is rocky in places.

Cliffs, boulders and pebbles

Fossils can be found within the limestone cliffs and boulders here. They are also present within the pebbles at the base of the beach.

ACCESS
RIGHTS

SSSI
The location is an SSSI. Only loose pebbles and cobbles may collected. Please do not damage or collect the in situ fossils.

Please follow our national fossil collecting code

Other Locations similar to Lydstep Headlane

You can also collect carboniferous Corals from; Portishead and Weston-Super-Mare in Avon, or along the South West Coast, you can also collect Devonian Corals from Torquay along Hopes Nose and Daddy Hole and Castleton, Parkhouse Hill,in the Derbyshire district. From South Wales, Carboniferous Corals can be found at Lydstep Headland, West Angle Bay and Manorbier Bay.

! IMPORTANT SAFETY NOTES !

Be careful not to stand under overhanging parts of the cliff. Mobile phone signals are likely to be lost at this location so be sure to tell someone where you are going and what time you expect to return. As the cove is so small and the path leads into it there is little chance of becoming cut off by the tide. Take care when climbing over boulders.

Stone Tumblers (Lapidary)

Microscopes

Test Sieves for Particle Analysis

Stone Tumblers are used for tumbling and polishing rough rock, stones and pebbles including those found on the beach and glass.

Whilst collecting fossils, on those days where you come back empty handed, you could collect rocks, stones and glass from the beach and tumble then at home.

These are all high quality machines to give a professional finish to your samples. The tumblers can be used with a variety of grits, most commonly Silicon Carbide Grit and Cerium Oxide. We have a wide range of rough rocks for sale too.

Microfossils are much easier to collect because they are so small that the vast majority of collections only concentrate on large finds. These small finds can simply be found by taking small samples of sands, crags, clays and soft rocks and examining them under a microscope.

We have a wide range of microscopes for sale, both for the study of fossils, but also educational and professional for use in the laboratory. We have Stereo microscopes, Compound Microscopes, Polarising Microscopes and Monocular Microscopes.

We have thousands of Test Sieves for Particle Analysis.

Endecotts Sieves: For accurate dependable results you can't buy a better test sieve than Endecotts. At every stage of manufacture each test sieve is individually inspected.

High Precision Tecan manufactures precision apertures as small as 3 microns for a wide array of applications such as filtering, sieving and nozzles. Its high-performance, ASTM/ISO compliant test sieves satisfy the most demanding fine particle grading requirements.

Lydstep Headland Fossils and Fossil Collecting Your SW Wales Geological Guide and Geology Info

Lydstep Headland Fossils and Fossil Collecting
Your SW Wales Geological Guide and Geology Info