Winter storms can often bring the more interesting things on to the shores of the UK. All manner of weird and wonderful things get washed up, from swordfish, palm seeds from the Caribbean and ambergris or whale vomit! So when you go beach combing you really never know what you might find.

Kidwelly is a great place to have a go as the vast estuary funnels floating debris down and the winter storms created collection points on the coastline there. The most common things of interest for me and the kids are shells, sea urchins, mermaids purses (shark egg cases) and drift wood.

This is something I particularly like doing with the family. We often have a challenge to find the best shell or biggest mermaids purse and all kinds of things pop up.

The trip that these picture were taken of was on a windy, fresh February day and I reckon a storm must have just been through. Lots of mermaids purses, in fact three different types of shark. Sea urchin skeletons were another thing we found a lot of and a few nice shells too. Its a wild beach this time of year and with this comes lots of food for birdlife, if you don’t find any beach treasure you will definitely see some great birds!

Unfortunately there is always plastic on the shores too, so we also add in a beach clean, removing a bag of rubbish if we can. As beach users I think we have a duty in the modern age to add this to our normal everyday activity.

What can you do with sharks egg case you ask?

Well recording them on The Shark Trust database can help with conservation work to help protect sharks and the breeding grounds. Great way to give something back.