"We're going on a mammoth hunt."

[Striatolamia]

The tide tables for the Bank Holiday weekend suggested we should perhaps make a return visit to Beltinge to search for more sharks teeth, but the weather forecast put us off; predicted onshore winds would probably hold the water in the estuary preventing the best parts of the beach from being uncovered. So, having been offered the use of a caravan on the north Norfolk coast, we decided a change of scene would be interesting and looked forward to the challenge of a new beach to search.

 

East Runton and West Runton beaches are famous for their geology and wealth of fossils. Rocks from the Cretaceous onwards are present and a wide variety of finds can be made if conditions are favourable. Several recent postings on social media showed some lovely mammoth teeth and other bones had been found, probably brought ashore by the strong north-easterly winds during the winter and early spring.

 

Due to other commitments we didn't arrive until late on Sunday night. The following morning we were greeted by bright sunshine but there was no rush to get down to the beach as the tide wasn't due to uncover the foreshore until late morning. After a leisurely breakfast we headed down to the beach. Unfortunately for most of the holidaymakers, the northerly breeze had brought thick fog off the sea and it clung to the coast, turning the conditions decidedly cold and damp - not good for making sandcastles and having picnics, but fine for fossil hunting! The majority of the morning visitors had abandoned the beach and we had the place pretty much to ourselves.

 

Looking east towards Cromer. Not much sign of spring bank holiday visitors!

 

[Striatolamia]

It didn't take long to find the first fossils. As predicted by our hosts, the beach was stuffed with belemnites and after the initial delight at finding some quite large examples they soon became relegated to 'background noise'. 

 

The jumble of flint pebbles, chunks of chalk and ironstone nodules also contained a bewildering variety of additional rocks of all shapes, sizes and colours. Finding interesting items was not so much a case of "looking for recognisable shapes or patterns" but more about "relaxing and letting the oddities jump out at you" (this piece of wisdom courtesy of my 12 year old son).

 

An Echinocorys sea urchin preserved as a flint infill was the first notable find. They seem to be quite scarce on these beaches as we only found one other complete example over our three days of searching.

 

 

 

[LiamL]

Looks like a great beach, hopefully you might get lucky and find a mammoth tooth later in your trip!

[Tidgy's Dad]

Very nice report! 

The Echinocorys is a nice find. 

[Striatolamia]

Soon after finding the echinoid, my attention was grabbed by a particularly dark and familiarly-textured item. Sure enough, it was our first piece of fossilized bone of the trip. Its size meant it was part of a quite large bone but it's shape doesn't give much clue as to what it might be from. As there are various large mammal remains recorded from this stretch of coast I don't hold out much hope of being able to identify it any more specifically.

 

[Striatolamia]

The rest of the afternoon was spent continuing the search. I found three more bone pieces, one of which is probably a part of a large rib. Interestingly, the preservation of the bones is quite different; two are very dark blackish in colour and very heavy, one (the rib fragment) is a lighter dark brownish colour with a finer grain to its structure and the smallest is almost creamy orange with darker brown markings. Perhaps they're from different strata or sources? Peter also found a tiny bone fragment which has a completely different 'feel' to the others and I wonder if it is from a much smaller animal.

 

Five lumps of fossilized bone and something else. The item bottom left has us puzzled; it is preserved in pyrite and looks similar in texture to a sponge but we can't think of anything which it might match.

[Striatolamia]

Day two began foggy, windy and chilly. The bank holiday weekend had finished so almost all the holidaymakers had gone home. Just a handful of dog walkers braved the inhospitable beach. We dressed for winter and set out for more fossil finding fun.

 

Hard to believe it's officially summer!

 

The beach hadn't changed much during the overnight tide and we were confident we would do well having got to know the shoreline a little bit better.

[Striatolamia]

It was slow going to start with. Belemnites and more belemnites but not much else for about half an hour. Then the first piece of bone; small, brown and probably unidentifiable but nice to 'get my eye in' all the same. It was while Peter was inspecting it and we were discussing what it might be from that I noticed something unusual, something clearly different from all the other things around it. The urge to pick it up immediately was almost irresistible, but I managed to hold myself back and take a photo before reaching down.

 

[Striatolamia]

The excitement in picking it up was fantastic. I knew it was going to be something good. Once in my hand it was obviously a bone and an unbroken one too. Turning it over and looking closely showed it was almost unworn and very fresh looking. It was also astonishingly heavy and seemed to be preserved in some kind of ironstone. Its shape was completely unfamiliar to me so I wasn't able to answer any of Peter's questions. We would have to wait until we got back to the caravan and a decent phone signal before we could try to work out what it was.

 

Very, very exciting!

 

[Striatolamia]

We now were in a dilemma. Having found the big one, should we go back and show it to the rest of the family and try to find out what it is, or do we carry on searching? Since there were still several hours remaining before the tide covered the beach once more we chose to continue looking. Nothing else we subsequently found was in quite the same league, but four more pieces of bone, a section of possible turtle carapace and a probable crocodile scute were all excellent finds and would have been outstanding items on any other day.

 

Five more bones, including a nicely shaped piece on the far right.

 

Two possibles: turtle carapace and crocodile scute?

[Striatolamia]

Back at the caravan we took more photos of the bone and uploaded them to a Facebook fossil group to see if anyone might be able to identify it. It didn't take very long for the hive mind to diagnose a proboscidean medial phalange, or elephant toe bone. From its size it is probably from a mammoth species, three of which have been recorded from the north Norfolk coast.

 

[Darktooth]

Very cool! Congratulations on a good hunt and time spent with family!

[Bobby Rico]

Great finds and Norfolk is beautiful. Good report thank you for sharing.

[Miocene_Mason]

Glad you had a good time, and glad you shared that epic Mammoth bone with us! Thanks!

22 minutes ago, Bobby Rico said:

and is Norfolk beautiful

If you were in America and said that some would give you a puzzled look

(Maybe it’s just me, there’s just something I never liked about Norfolk, VA)

[Bobby Rico]

5 minutes ago, WhodamanHD said:

Glad you had a good time, and glad you shared that epic Mammoth bone with us! Thanks!

If you were in America and said that some would give you a puzzled look

(Maybe it’s just me, there’s just something I never liked about Norfolk, VA)

Do you mean Norfolk Vergina, USA.?

[Miocene_Mason]

15 minutes ago, Bobby Rico said:

Do you mean Norfolk Vergina, USA.?

Yeah (Virginia)

Some people love it. Just not for me I guess.

[Bobby Rico]

Just now, WhodamanHD said:

Yeah (Virginia)

Thank for heads up then. I give there a miss.

[Miocene_Mason]

6 minutes ago, Bobby Rico said:

Thank for heads up then. I give there a miss.

Well if you like naval history it can be cool. I haven’t heard of any fossils there though....

 

[Peace river rat]

2 hours ago, WhodamanHD said:

Yeah (Virginia)

Some people love it. Just not for me I guess.

I am a Civil war buff, myself.

[Miocene_Mason]

11 minutes ago, Peace river rat said:

I am a Civil war buff, myself.

I’m no civil war buff, though I do like history. If you ever want a cool Civil war place, and you happen to be in Maryland, I’m volunteering as a docent at Union Mills historical site and you can get within inches of civil war object and walk the floors that the soldiers did. 

 

P.S. sorry for taking this off topic 

[ynot]

Looks like You have been having a good time with the beach all to Yourself (and family). Gotta love the fog.

Nice finds too.

[Striatolamia]

20 hours ago, LiamL said:

Looks like a great beach, hopefully you might get lucky and find a mammoth tooth later in your trip!

 

19 hours ago, Tidgy's Dad said:

Very nice report! 

The Echinocorys is a nice find. 

 

16 hours ago, Darktooth said:

Very cool! Congratulations on a good hunt and time spent with family!

 

16 hours ago, Bobby Rico said:

Great finds and Norfolk is beautiful. Good report thank you for sharing.

 

15 hours ago, WhodamanHD said:

Glad you had a good time, and glad you shared that epic Mammoth bone with us! Thanks!

 

10 hours ago, ynot said:

Looks like You have been having a good time with the beach all to Yourself (and family). Gotta love the fog.

Nice finds too.

Thanks everyone for your kind words. We had a marvelous time. There's a little more stuff still to report on...

 

[Striatolamia]

Our final day of the holiday was once again foggy and cold, but the wind had dropped a little and shifted more easterly. The beach was covered with more sand than previously and it made spotting fossils more difficult as the smaller pebbles and shingle were obscured. We still managed to find four pieces of bone, two interesting fragments of plant (?) material preserved in ironstone and a larger unknown item also similarly preserved.

 

 

Having spent the best part of three days on the beach and found at least one certain mammoth bone along with plenty of other interesting items we were well pleased with our stay. We headed home looking forward to researching our finds and making plans for our next visit.