What's in
the Box?

Wood washed into the sea by rivers or tides, carried by ocean currents until it reaches shore. It can travel thousands of miles before landing on a beach. It often turns dark or bleached white from salt and sun.

The largest sea snail in UK seas. Whelks are carnivores — they hunt worms and other molluscs. Their cream or brown spiralling shells are often found washed up in the strandline. Empty whelk shells make brilliant homes for hermit crabs.

A small sea snail — just like Shelly! Flat periwinkles come in a range of colours from bright yellow to dark brown. They graze on seaweed in rockpools and are very common on UK rocky shores. Their flat, rounded shells make them easy to spot.

Limpets cling to rocks with remarkable force using a muscular foot. At low tide they clamp down tight to keep moisture in. At high tide they travel across rocks grazing on algae, then return to the exact same spot — their home scar. They start life male and later become female.

Seagulls shed their feathers gradually throughout the year in a process called moulting. Each feather is coated in natural oil that makes it waterproof. Herring gulls — the most common gull on UK beaches — are on the Red List, meaning their numbers are declining.

A bivalve mollusc — its shell is in two halves. Cockles live just beneath sandy and muddy beaches, filtering tiny food particles from the water. Their round white shells with deep ridges are one of the most common finds on UK beaches. They have been eaten by humans here for thousands of years.

Mussels anchor themselves to rocks and each other using strong fibres called byssus threads — also known as a beard. They filter food from the water and form dense colonies called mussel beds, which are vital habitats for many other beach species including small crabs and worms.

A flatter, oval shell with ridges running lengthways rather than fanning out. Striped Venus clams live buried in sandy seabeds in shallow water, filtering food from the water. Their white, cream or yellow shells are often beautifully patterned and can live up to 10 years.

A soft limestone made from the compressed remains of tiny marine creatures called coccolithophores that lived in warm shallow seas around 70–100 million years ago. The cliffs along the Thanet coast — and the famous White Cliffs of Dover — are made of chalk.

Fragments of rock smoothed and rounded over thousands of years by waves and water. On Margate beach you'll find pebbles of many different rock types — flint, chalk, sandstone and more — each with its own colour and texture. No two pebbles are ever exactly alike.

As crabs grow, they shed their hard outer shell in a process called moulting. The crab crawls out of its old shell, which is left behind looking like a complete empty crab. It then grows a new, larger shell. Young crabs can moult several times a year.

The egg case of a shark, skate or ray. Made of keratin — the same material as your fingernails — it protects the developing embryo. Once the baby hatches, the empty case washes ashore. The shape of the tendrils tells you which species laid it.

Broken bottles or glassware that ended up in the ocean, tumbled by the sea against sand and rocks for decades until smoothed and frosted into beautiful gems. It takes 20–40 years to make a single piece of sea glass. Green, brown and white are the most common colours.

The egg case of the Common Whelk. Each spongy ball is made of hundreds of individual egg capsules fused together — sometimes containing up to 2,000 eggs. Once the young whelks have hatched, the empty cases wash ashore. People used to use them as natural sponges!

A common brown seaweed on rocky shores. Its air-filled bladders appear in pairs along the fronds and allow it to float upright to absorb sunlight. Bladder wrack is an important habitat for flat periwinkles, sea slaters and small crabs — including Shelly's favourite hiding spot.

A very hard rock formed from silica within chalk. Used by humans for over a million years — Stone Age people chipped it into sharp tools and weapons. On Thanet beaches, flint tumbles out of the chalk cliffs and is smoothed by the sea over centuries.