Tag Archives: Cuckmere Haven

311/365 Mermaid’s purse

07 Thursday Nov 2019

Posted by in coastal fauna, fish, nature, seaside

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I found this egg case on the beach at Cuckmere Haven a week or so ago. With such a leathery, tough outer skin, it’s easy to see how well this could protect the embryo that must once have been inside.

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I checked the Shark Trust website’s identification page and, given the south coast location, I think this eggcase might belong to a ray, perhaps a Spotted ray (Raja montagui) or an Undulate ray (Raja undulata).

I’m not sure where the name Mermaid’s purse came from – perhaps it’s simply because the eggcases come from the sea, are vaguely purse-shaped and hold something valuable inside them.

307/ 365 Grey phalarope

03 Sunday Nov 2019

Posted by in autumn, birds, nature

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191103 grey phalarope (1)

A week ago today, during a short break in East Sussex, I enjoyed a superb long walk with two good friends at Cuckmere Haven, and there was a wonderful birding bonus, a Grey phalarope (Phalaropus fulicarius).

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I knew the bird had been seen in the vicinity but Cuckmere is a huge area and was then much submerged after recent heavy rains so I didn’t expect to spot one small bird amongst the many enjoying all the water. My luck was in though, as this lovely creature was swimming about on a pool of water quite close to the main path down to the beach.

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This was only my second ever sighting of a Grey phalarope, as these are birds that breed in the Arctic, spend most of their lives far out at sea, and only usually turn up around the British coast after bad weather.

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Little egrets, again

22 Thursday Feb 2018

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It seems Little egrets (Egretta garzetta) are rather partial to southern England as I saw several during my holiday in East Sussex last week, at Rye Harbour Nature Reserve and in the fields behind Winchelsea Beach.

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We also get Little egrets in Wales, of course, and I’ve blogged about them before, when there were two visiting a Cardiff lake last July, but I was delighted to get much closer to one particular bird last Saturday at Cuckmere Haven. The weather was glorious, and people were out in droves to enjoy the almost-summery day, but this lovely little bird simply moved slightly further away as they passed, then returned to the well-trodden grassy path to continue probing for earthworms and miscellaneous insects.

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Wild words: chalk

21 Wednesday Feb 2018

Posted by in geology, nature, seaside

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Chalk: noun; ‘a white soft earthy limestone (calcium carbonate) formed from the skeletal remains of sea creatures’, according to the Oxford Dictionary, though that seems a relatively simplistic explanation to me. I chose chalk as this week’s word as I was in East Sussex last week and had occasion twice to see the magnificent chalk cliffs known as the Seven Sisters, once at Birling Gap in a howling gale and again, at Cuckmere Haven, on a day that felt like summer had come early to southern England.

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The Discovering Fossils website has this to say about the chalk at the Seven Sisters:

The Chalk at Seven Sisters belongs to the Upper Chalk, and was deposited during the Coniacian and Santonian stages of the Late Cretaceous epoch between 87-84 million years ago (mya). At this time Seven Sisters and much of Great Britain, along with Europe, lay beneath a relatively shallow sea around 40°N of the equator, on an equivalent latitude to the Mediterranean Sea today.

And you can read more about the fascinating process of chalk formation here.

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A lunchtime fossick at Cuckmere Haven

22 Monday May 2017

Posted by in coastal fauna, nature

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170522 Cuckmere Haaven 7 sisters

To me, this is one of the most beautiful views in the world so what better place to sit and enjoy a picnic lunch after our wildlife walk around Seaford Head.

And, of course, I couldn’t resist a little fossick to see what the sea had washed in. Jill found the first Mermaid’s purse, one of the leathery brown-black egg cases of rays and sharks, then I found two more. The cream-coloured egg cases of Whelks were scattered all around, and Jill also discovered a sizeable chunk of Cuttlefish bone. Empty seashells lay everywhere amongst the shingle and flint, with limpets and whelks the most numerous. But then my eyes were drawn back to just soaking in the views of the incredible chalk cliffs of the Seven Sisters.

170522 Cuckmere Haven sea fauna