The Great Eggcase Hunt at Rye Harbour Nature Reserve before Easter was a fantastic success. More than 60 adults and children joined in to explore the beach, looking for mermaid purses.
Mermaid purses are the eggcases of sharks, skates and rays, and recording the incidence of these along the coast provides valuable information about the relative health of the different species locally.
Once discovered, we identified them and the results are as follows:
- 18 Small Spotted Catshark eggcases
- 20 Thornback Ray eggcases
- 10 Spotted Ray eggcases
The next step is to send this information to The Shark Trust to add to the national database.
Future events at Rye Harbour Nature Reserve can be found on the Sussex Wildlife Trust webpage
Photos: Andy Dinsdale