Crook Ness opens onto the Burniston shore, where Middle Jurassic plant-bearing rocks and dinosaur tracks record rivers and vegetated floodplains. The Long Nab Member rewards careful observation, but fixed track surfaces, unstable cliffs and a rocky tidal foreshore need particular care.
FIND FREQUENCY: ♦♦ – Plant remains and trace fossils are better-supported targets than the old broad marine-shell claim.
CHILDREN: ♦♦ – The rocky foreshore and difficult footing make this unsuitable for young children.
ACCESS: ♦♦♦ – The traditional Burniston approach reaches a cliff-top path; check the descent and current signs before continuing.
TYPE: – Loose plant-bearing material where permitted, and non-destructive observation of sandstone track surfaces.
DIRECTIONS
♦ Approach on the A171 north of Scarborough and turn in Burniston onto the small road signposted towards Crook Ness.
♦ The traditional route reaches a limited cliff-top parking area and a footpath to the shore. Park only where currently permitted, without blocking access, and follow current signs; turn back if the descent is damaged or closed.
♦ The published field-guide start reference is TA 026 935. Plan the rocky shore walk with the tide and swell, retaining a safe route back.
♦ Original locality reference: 54.32737°N, 0.42304°W. Neither this nor the field-study exposure reference certifies the current car-park entrance.
FOSSIL HUNTING
The Long Nab Member at this part of Burniston Bay contains plant-bearing mudstone, siltstone and sandstone, together with dinosaur tracks. Rooted and carbonaceous sediment, flattened stems and sideritic nodules help reveal the vegetated landscape in which the beds accumulated. A regional marine fossil list should not be transferred to these non-marine beds.
The Burniston Footprint Bed is explicitly associated with the steps at Crook Ness in the published track account. Its sandstone package records tracks near the base and top. Observe and photograph accessible surfaces without removing them or standing beneath overhanging sandstone to examine foot casts.
For permitted loose plant-bearing slabs, retain part and counterpart and label the exact position and orientation. Do not dig cliff faces or use a recent fall as an invitation to work below unstable rock. Fragile carbon films need support and minimal handling.
The separately studied event bed and higher southern-bay ripple-laminated sandstone are distinct observations, not extra layers that can be inserted at an assumed spacing into the footprint package. Significant new tracks or vertebrate material should be recorded and referred to a suitable museum or site manager.
A chronological record of discoveries, research and conservation at Crook Ness.
1913–1914 – The Burniston footprint-bearing bed recorded
Hargreaves’s early work documented the dinosaur footprint-bearing sandstone at Burniston. Later locality descriptions identify the famous ledge at the Crook Ness steps in the middle of the bay.
1928–1929 – River-channel structures studied
Black investigated channel architecture and associated floodplain deposits along this coast. These studies helped establish the non-marine setting of the footprint-bearing succession.
1986 – Wider geological coast protected
The revised Iron Scar and Hundale Point to Scalby Ness SSSI citation encompasses this coastal stretch. The 1984 first notification applied to Scalby Ness alone and should not be presented as Crook Ness’s exact designation date.
2003 – Footprint-bed locality explicitly reconciled
Romano and Whyte’s review identifies the steps at Crook Ness as the middle-Burniston location of the Footprint Bed, resolving an important distinction between the access point and neighbouring named headlands.
2017–2018 – Tracks and plants studied together
Slater and colleagues’ study, published online in December 2017 and in the 2018 volume, combined the dinosaur tracks with plant and palynological evidence. Their approximately 0.60 m sandstone package preserves prints near its base and top, providing evidence of a vegetated floodplain repeatedly crossed by dinosaurs.
GEOLOGY
The Bathonian Scalby Formation belongs to the Ravenscar Group. Here its Long Nab Member comprises grey laminated mudstones and siltstones, with fine- to medium-grained sandstone, planar bedding and cross-stratification. Channels cut into muddy floodplain deposits and change laterally into sandstone fills.
Rooted clay, plant debris and carbonaceous layers record vegetation and episodes of floodplain stability. Dinosaur tracks on suitable sandstone surfaces preserve activity within that changing landscape. Their geometry may be altered by sediment deformation and does not automatically identify a dinosaur species.
The Crook Ness footprint package is approximately 0.60 m thick in the published study. A separate 40–145 mm event bed was traced for at least 165 m and has its own palynological evidence and cautious crevasse-splay interpretation. No unsupported vertical separation or equivalence is asserted between them.
The detailed section keeps those local observations distinct from a 0.9 m ripple-laminated sandstone described farther south in Burniston Bay. Neighbouring headlands and the plant records at Scalby Ness are not stacked into a fictitious Crook Ness measured column.
Detailed geology and fossil-bearing horizons at Crook Ness.
RAVENSCAR GROUP
At Crook Ness the fossil-bearing rocks form part of the Middle Jurassic coastal-plain succession, dominated here by non-marine deposits. Marine beds farther north along the wider protected section must not be imported as Crook Ness exposures.
Scalby Formation
The Crook Ness approach reaches the Long Nab Member in the middle of Burniston Bay. Plant-bearing mudrocks, channel sandstone and dinosaur-trampled surfaces record a low-lying river landscape. The older Moor Grit forms part of the formation’s regional lower division but is not a second automatically exposed Crook Ness collecting unit.
Long Nab Member
The member is exposed from south of Long Nab into Burniston Bay. Its basal muddy sandstones pass upwards into rooted and locally carbonaceous mudrocks, thin alternating sandstones and silty clays, and local channel fills. Cut-and-fill relationships mean that a simple vertical chart alone cannot show the exposure accurately.
Basal muddy sandstone package
The uppermost sandstone division distinguished in the broader coastal section is extremely muddy sandstone or siltstone with medium-scale cross-bedding, locally horizontal bedding, and soft-sediment deformation. It marks the base of the Long Nab Member in the cited scheme. Its broader coastal definition is retained without assigning an invented Crook Ness thickness.
Rooted and carbonaceous clay interval
The published Burniston section records 2–3 m of grey clay above the basal sandstone, with dark beds containing flattened plant stems. Rootlets enter the underlying sandstone; sideritic concretions and sphaerosiderite are prominent. The clay is part of the soil/floodplain succession, not a marine shell bed.
Level-bedded sandstone–silty clay alternations and channel fills
Thin, relatively horizontal sandstone and silty clay beds pass laterally into strongly cross-bedded channel sandstone. Some channels cut down to the underlying clay. Black’s work on these structures underpins later interpretation of the local meander plain.
Burniston Footprint Bed at the Crook Ness steps
The overhanging silty sandstone ledge at the steps preserves dinosaur footprint casts. The steps are explicitly identified as Crook Ness in the published track review. A later study describes a sandstone package about 0.60 m thick in the middle of the bay, with prints especially at its base and also near its top. Document tracks photographically rather than removing the in-situ surface. Its sampled palynoflora is locally dominated by fern spores.
Informal event bed — section C, sample JP2/12
In the study’s section C, a 40–145 mm event bed was traced for at least 165 m and yielded Reticuspinosporites whytei. It was cautiously interpreted as a confined crevasse-splay deposit entering a shallow interdistributary bay. It is distinct from the Footprint Bed and the 0.9 m sandstone farther south; no unmeasured vertical spacing between them is implied.
Higher ripple-laminated sandstone southwards in Burniston Bay
About 3 m above the Footprint Bed towards the southern bay, the GCR records 0.9 m of well-sorted fine sandstone with ripple-drift lamination. Infilled burrows mark its base and rootlets its top; farther southeast, where it wedges out, long shallow U-shaped scour channels are visible at its base. These are explicitly southern-bay observations, not a thickness measured at the Crook Ness steps.
Neighbouring exposures kept separate
Cromer Point’s large channel sandstone and natural arch, the Scalby Bay cross-bedded meander-belt platform and its track trail, and the Scalby Ness Ginkgo beds are different exposures. They explain the wider landscape but are not extra beds or discoveries at Crook Ness.
References
Existing UK Fossils Crook Ness guide
Cox & Sumbler (2002), Hundale Point–Scalby Ness, GCR 26
Romano & Whyte (2003), Jurassic dinosaur tracks and trackways, PYGS 54,185–215
Slater et al. (online 2017; volume 2018), Dinosaur–plant interactions at Burniston Bay
SAFETY
The descent and rough foreshore can be unstable and slippery. Check tide and swell, keep a return route open and leave before water closes off the shore. Avoid fresh falls, undercut faces and cliff digging.
Never stand beneath overhanging sandstone to inspect tracks or hammer its underside. Photograph from a safe position; protecting both people and the scientific surface takes priority over obtaining a specimen.
EQUIPMENT
Take sturdy grippy footwear, tide information, a phone, camera, hand lens, notebook and padded rigid boxes with supports for fragile loose slabs. Hammering fixed tracks, cliffs or overhangs is inappropriate.
CLEANING AND TREATING
Support the whole plant-bearing slab, retain counterparts and avoid rubbing carbon films. Do not wash friable shale or routinely apply PVA. Dry slowly and store under stable conditions.
Leave sandstone casts intact rather than trimming away their trace geometry. Record provenance and orientation before preparation. Monitor pyritic material and seek specialist help for unusual or unstable finds.
IDENTIFY YOUR FINDS
Need help identifying a fossil? Share clear photos, where you found it and its size with the community.
FURTHER READING
Deposits: Bringing the best out of your fossils
Slater et al. (online 2017; volume 2018), Dinosaur–plant interactions at Burniston Bay
Romano & Whyte (2003), Jurassic dinosaur tracks and trackways, PYGS 54,185–215
Cox & Sumbler (2002), Hundale Point–Scalby Ness, GCR 26
Natural England SSSI citation
Geologists’ Association Yorkshire coast guide itinerary summaries
Leeds Geological Association 2015 field reports
ACCESS RIGHTS
Crook Ness lies within the protected coast described by the Iron Scar and Hundale Point to Scalby Ness SSSI citation; see the original linked document. Follow current landowner and management requirements, preserve fixed tracks and exposures and obey access restrictions. Designation does not itself grant collection permission.
It is important to follow our ‘Code of Conduct’ when collecting fossils or visiting any site. Please also read our ‘Terms and Conditions’.
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