No. 26 Hunt for fossils and bones

A girl holding up a pebble with a fossil in it on a beach in Yorkshire — A girl holding up a pebble with a fossil in it on a beach | © National Trust Images/Ian Shaw

Go on a time-travelling mission to uncover clues about animals and plants from the past. Our guide reveals the best places to hunt for fossils and bones. You can learn about the UK's best dinosaur discoveries too.

Keep safe

Make sure you check with an adult before setting off on your fossil-hunting adventure and keep clear of any unstable rocks or cliffs.

Let’s get hunting

Fossilised animals and plants can be as teeny-tiny as a seed, or as gigantic as a tyrannosaurus leg bone. They can be found anywhere – even in your garden – but they’re most easily spotted near the seashore on beaches, under rocks or by rivers. A great place to look for fossils and bones is on the Jurassic Coast (the clue is in the name), which stretches from Dorset to Devon.

Once you’ve found a good place to go hunting, look for signs in the rocks of plants and animals that once lived on the earth. There’s no need to break open stones or use a special hammer – you’ll often discover the best fossils loose on the ground.

Investigate your find

So you’ve found a fossil – now it’s time to take a closer look. Feel the weight and shape of the fossil with your hands. What do you think it was? Are there any parts missing? What lines and detail does it have? You could make a rubbing of the fossil with paper and a crayon, draw a picture of it or take a photograph for a memory book.

Where has it come from?

Fossils and bones are often washed across the sea, so your discovery may have travelled many miles. Use your imagination to think about the sort of land it once lived in. Where in the world do you think it came from? How old do you think it is? And what other animals and plants did it live alongside? Ask your friends for their ideas too – it could make for a great story.

A graphic shows the size of a cetiosaurus dinosaur compared to a girl — Cetiosaurus to scale | © National Trust Images

The UK's biggest dinosaur discoveries

The largest dinosaur remains found in the UK are thought to belong to cetiosaurus. This dinosaur is a type of sauropod, a four-legged plant eater with a long neck, a longer tail and a tiny head. The bones were dug up in Oxfordshire and Rutland. They showed that cetiosaurus was around 16 metres long, nearly as long as two double-decker buses.

One of the best preserved dinosaur skeletons found in the UK was comptonatus chasei, found in the cliffs at Compton Bay, one of the places we look after on the Isle of Wight. This was a type of iguanodon and nearly 150 bones were found.

A child holds out their hand, holding an ammonite, while standing on a wet sandy beach — Finding ammonites on the Yorkshire coast | © National Trust Images/Ian Shaw

Surprise treasures

When you're hunting for fossils and bones, don’t be surprised if you come across other treasures from the past. Experts look for natural and man-made clues to put together the jigsaw of our history. What can your discoveries tell you about the people, animals and landscapes that lived before you?

Fun fact: Fossil collector Mary Anning lived on the Jurassic Coast. She was only 12 when she excavated the first ichthyosaur in about 1811. — Fun fact | © National Trust Images

Building a collection

It’s great to build your own fossil collection and it’s often perfectly fine to take small fossils and bones home with you. But it’s always best to check the rules of the local area to see if you’re allowed to keep what you find. Let your nearest visitor centre or museum know if you uncover something special.