Samphire Hoe, Sussex, England

[Brittle Star]

Samphire Hoe, Sussex is not far from Dover and was created by dumping stuff from the digging of the Channel Tunnel. It is a wonderful nature reserve, has a small shop/café, access to the beach and chalk fossils are easy to find on the surface of the fallen blocks. Mobile phone service is a bit weird as my phone connected and said Welcome to France, but Dutch tourists there had English connection. Good job there is a pay phone. Here are just a few of the bits I took a photo of. Not completely prepped yet but you get the idea of what can be found. Some are micro fossils from the dust as chalk easy to break down or scoop up from the bottom of the cliff.

1 - common foram

2 - Ramulina foram

3 - Tiny tooth next to Tritaxia foram ( let me know if I have got my ID wrong)

4 - Fish scale

5 - Bivalve with encrusting bryozoa

6 & 7 -Onchotrochus serpentinus Corallite overhead view and of one end confirming not a serpula

7 to 9 - What I think is shed isopod skin, NHM could not ID it but then they sent it to the fish department.

 

[Fossildude19]

Interesting mix of finds.  

The 'fish scale" looks more like a conchostrachan, to me, however.  

 

[Brittle Star]

Hi, that is a thought, the photo does not do it justice, it is only just over 2mm and very see through, under the microscope it looks more like fish, but I will keep it in mind next time I take a look, will label it with a question mark. Thank you for your take on it.

Just had another thought do you get clam shrimps in sea water as well as fresh water.

[Al Dente]

Your Ramulina might be a piece of a stem from a bryozoan.

[Brittle Star]

I thought bryozoan would have pores visible, found plenty of them at other locations, but still learning.

[TqB]

Lovely stuff, I particularly like the Onchotrochus coral -  I mentioned on another forum that it's strikingly similar to the very distantly related Carboniferous heterocorals, especially Hexaphyllia which has sometimes been mistaken for a serpulid.

 

(I agree the Ramulina looks right, didn't know forams could look like that!)

 

[Brittle Star]

Thanks Tarquin, agglutinated forams are even more weird, I have a spiky one as well as one that looks like a sock. That's Oxford Clay for you. Will have to add it to my post for you to see.

[Al Dente]

1 hour ago, Brittle Star said:

I thought bryozoan would have pores visible, found plenty of them at other locations, but still learning.

Some of the branches won't have the pores. I was trying to find a good picture to show you but the best I could do were some pictures I took in an Eocene quarry here in North Carolina. These two pictures have many pieces of bryozoans, some are branches. The first shows how common bryozoan pieces are in the matrix. The second photo is of a shark tooth but if you look at the sediment to the top and also to the right of the tooth you will see some pieces of bryozoans similar to yours.