Dalmellington Burns Fossil Hunting

Water flowing over shallow stream-bed rocks in an original Dalmellington Burns locality photograph.

The burns around Dalmellington expose Carboniferous coal-bearing rocks, with fossil mussels recorded in several shale beds and plant fragments noted in the original field guide. Cummock Burn, Black Burn and the Craigmark gorges reveal different parts of this succession. Low water can expose more rock, but these historical collecting places require careful route planning and permission to collect.

FIND FREQUENCY: ♦♦ – Fossils are recorded from particular shale beds, but exposure and water levels strongly affect what can be seen; historical abundance is no guarantee of finds today.
CHILDREN: ♦♦ – Not recommended for children: deep gorges, slippery banks and moving water make this an unsuitable family collecting outing.
ACCESS: ♦♦ – Dispersed, sometimes difficult-to-locate historical exposures; use an OS 1:25,000 map and check current routes and conditions.
TYPE: Stream cuttings through Carboniferous coal-bearing rocks.

DIRECTIONS

♦ Use Dalmellington as the starting point and an OS 1:25,000 map to distinguish Cummock Burn, Black Burn and the separate Craigmark gorges. The guide’s original reference is 55.32845°N, 4.39407°W; it is retained for orientation, not as a verified parking place or a pin for every exposure.

♦ For Cummock Burn, the original guide described the track or road to the left when leaving Dalmellington on the B741. The Survey placed the Sloanstone exposure on the right bank, opposite Camlarg House, 400 yards (about 366 m) upstream of Manse Bridge. Camlarg House was subsequently demolished: this is a historical landmark, and the former house site and approach must be matched to a current map before use. A separate fossil bed was recorded about 100 yards (91 m) upstream of the bridge.

♦ North of Craigmark, four gorges were described: Cladwell’s Glen beside the road towards Benquhat, an unnamed glen immediately east of Craigmark Hill, Tongue Glen and Chalmerston Glen. The western gorge is the one highlighted in the old guide; do not assume a safe descent from the road.

♦ The Black Burn fossil locality was recorded between Benbeoch and Benbain, 400 yards (about 366 m) north-west of Benbain Cottage. This historical distance identifies the published locality; it does not establish a present-day approach or permission.

♦ The last recorded field inspection was in 2008. Check current paths, bridges and forestry or restoration work before visiting. East Ayrshire Council’s Access Officer can advise on route questions through Ayrshire360, 0345 724 0000. Arrange any collecting permission separately.

FOSSIL HUNTING

The principal documented fossils are nonmarine bivalves, traditionally called freshwater mussels, in the fine-grained sediments associated with the coal seams. These records concern several different stream sections, rather than one fossil bed that can be followed from burn to burn. On accessible, naturally exposed shale surfaces, look for shell outlines, curved growth markings and impressions or casts. A hand lens and photographs taken with a scale are more useful for an initial assessment than breaking poorly located material.

At Cummock Burn, the historical Sloanstone Coal exposure opposite Camlarg House has several mussel-bearing shale bands above it. The Survey recorded these about 400 yards upstream of Manse Bridge. It did not supply a named species for each band, so their association with the coal and the shale matrix is more informative than an assumed identification. A separate fossiliferous shale roughly 100 yards above the bridge yielded the form recorded as Anthracomya adamsi. This is a historical name; the old description also used a coal correlation and fossil zone that were revised later. Keep the two bridge-related localities separate in specimen notes.

Black Burn offers a different published target: pale grey to white, soft shale described by miners as calmstone or calmy metals. The fossiliferous bed was placed approximately 60 feet (18.3 m) below the Sillyhole Coal, at the locality north-west of Benbain Cottage. The historical identification is Anthracomya cf. cymbula; “cf.” records a comparison, not a secure species determination. Freshly wetted and weathered shale can look very different, and colour alone cannot establish that a loose piece belongs to this bed. Do not mistake the vertical stratigraphic separation for a walking distance.

In the Craigmark gorges, the useful contrasts are between coal, iron-rich shale, blackband ironstone and the higher marine-band rocks. The Cladwell’s Glen section includes an iron-rich shale historically described as containing “entomostraca”, an old broad term for small crustaceans, above the Craigmark Blackband ironstone. No named species is established here. Related shale was also noted at old ironstone workings in Tongue Glen; material on old spoil cannot by itself locate the bed in the adjacent natural section.

Higher in Tongue Glen, the Survey recorded fossiliferous dark limestone in Skipsey’s Marine Band, with blue shale above and mixed shale, sandstone ribs and nodular fireclay below. This records a marine episode within the predominantly coal-bearing succession. The reviewed exact-outcrop description does not justify transferring a district-wide marine species list to this limestone. Record whether a find is in limestone, shale or ironstone and whether it is in place or loose, rather than assuming every shell belongs to the same mussel fauna.

Plant remains were noted in Alister Cruickshanks’s original field guide, but no species list or precise plant-bearing horizon was given. Look for genuine repeated vein or branching patterns on exposed surfaces and photograph the surrounding matrix as well as the possible fossil. The original fossil photograph below is retained without assigning it to a named species.

Where collection and retention are permitted, keep each locality and bed separate, retain associated matrix, and record the date, position, lithology and whether the specimen was loose. Never excavate streambanks, strip vegetation or alter the channel to reach a bed. If permission, stability or identification is uncertain, photograph the find in place and seek advice. Unusual material is most useful scientifically when its exact context survives.

Significant discoveries and geological research milestones in the Dalmellington burn sections, in chronological order.

1932 – Coal sections and intrusive relationships documented
A detailed geological account recorded the Sloanstone Coal section in Cummock Burn opposite Camlarg House, including its sandstone roof, shale layers, coal leaves and stone parting. It also described the Diamond–Sillyhole succession in Black Burn and the different levels occupied by local igneous sills. These observations established a framework for comparing the separate stream exposures.

1949 – Fossil localities and Craigmark logs described
A revised geological account set out the two distinct Cummock fossil localities and the pale fossiliferous shale in Black Burn, preserving the fossil records reported in 1936 under the names Anthracomya adamsi and Anthracomya cf. cymbula. It distinguished the four Craigmark gorges and documented the Craigmark Blackband and Tongue Glen marine-band sections, alongside natural coking and columnar jointing in Sillyhole Coal. This is a publication milestone, rather than a demonstrated date of first discovery.

1967 – Marine-band and coal correlations revised
W. Mykura, with palaeontological contributions by M. A. Calver and R. B. Wilson, located the Queenslie Marine Band in Cummock Burn and revised the regional correlations used to interpret these stream sections. The revised framework distinguished Minnivey/Ayr Hard from Chalmerston/Jewel and placed the upper boundary of the historical Modiolaris Zone at Lower Diamond Coal. It showed why older seam names and fossil-zone assignments need careful interpretation.

GEOLOGY

The Dalmellington burns cut through parts of the Scottish Coal Measures Group, a Late Carboniferous (Pennsylvanian) succession of sandstone, siltstone, mudstone, seatearth and coal. Much of the fossil-bearing succession discussed here belongs to the Scottish Middle Coal Measures Formation, of Duckmantian age. The burns also provide older context and reach the marine horizon defining the start of the Upper Coal Measures; giving every exposure a single age of 310 million years would obscure these relationships.

These rocks record a changing lowland landscape. River systems brought sand and finer sediment into floodplains and standing water, while waterlogged vegetation accumulated the peat that eventually became coal. Fine mud preserved nonmarine bivalves between episodes of peat growth and sediment influx. Sandstone ribs, softer shales and harder iron-rich beds therefore weather differently in the burns, making some horizons prominent while others are concealed by water, vegetation or debris. A named coal is a useful local marker, not a separate formation.

Cummock Burn includes the measured Sloanstone Coal section and nearby fossiliferous shales, whereas Black Burn displays part of the higher Diamond–Sillyhole interval. Craigmark comprises four separate gorges exposing different parts of the succession, including Craigmark Blackband and, in Tongue Glen, Skipsey’s Marine Band. They cannot be joined into a single complete measured stream log. The present formation boundaries lie at the base of Queenslie (Vanderbeckei) Marine Band below and the base of Skipsey (Aegiranum) Marine Band above. The limestone and shale of the latter record a marine incursion into this otherwise predominantly nonmarine setting.

The historical literature needs particular care because seam names and fossil-zone correlations changed. The 1932 Survey equated Chalmerston with Ayr Hard, while Mykura’s 1967 correlation identifies Chalmerston with Jewel and Minnivey with Ayr Hard. The older Cummock description “below Ayr Hard” therefore cannot simply be plotted below modern Minnivey without further exact-locality reconciliation. Likewise, the old Modiolaris zonal boundary was revised. The detailed section retains the actual observations while distinguishing the old terminology from the later framework.

Igneous intrusions add another geological story. At Tongue Glen, intrusion beside Sillyhole Coal produced natural coke and columnar jointing; burnt coal and a sill were also described at Black Burn. Other sills were traced through Cummock Burn and Craigmark Hill at different stratigraphic positions. Their heat altered nearby sediment, but they do not form fossil-bearing sedimentary members. The chart separates the stream sections and measured fragments; the expanded account below preserves the bed-level observations and their sources.

Schematic framework of separate Dalmellington Burns sections, showing the current Scottish Coal Measures formation boundaries, Sloanstone Coal, Black Burn calmstone, Craigmark Blackband and Tongue Glen marine band.
Schematic correlation of separate historical stream sections, not a continuous measured log. Current formation boundaries follow the BGS Lexicon; detailed Sloanstone beds and source qualifications are in the expanded geology.
Detailed geology of Dalmellington Burns: separate stream sections, fossil-bearing shales, coal seams, marine bands and igneous contacts.

The Cummock Burn, Black Burn and Craigmark gorges expose different parts of the coal-bearing succession north and east of Dalmellington. They are separate, incomplete stream sections, not one continuous measured column. Most of the detailed observations below were published in 1932, 1949 and 1967. Their distances locate historical observations; they do not confirm present exposure, safe access or permission to remove specimens. No formal members have been established for the sections described here.

SCOTTISH COAL MEASURES GROUP

Age and depositional setting. These are Late Carboniferous, or Pennsylvanian, sedimentary rocks. Regionally, the group records river channels, floodplains, lakes and peat-forming wetlands, interrupted by occasional marine incursions. Sandstone, siltstone, mudstone, seatearth and coal occur in repeated sedimentary cycles. Seatearths represent ancient soils, while coal records accumulated plant material subsequently buried and altered. Nonmarine bivalve-bearing shales and the rarer marine bands provide different kinds of correlation evidence. This regional interpretation does not imply that every cycle or fossil association is visible in every burn.

Scottish Lower Coal Measures Formation: older Cummock context

Beoch Mussel Band correlation. A 1967 reassessment concluded that mussel beds in Cummock Burn and Auldnaw Glen previously attributed to the roof of the Pennyvenie High Coking Coal appeared instead to belong to the Beoch Mussel Band. This is older, Lower Coal Measures context along the watercourse. The published comparison does not identify it with either of the familiar points 100 or 400 yards above the manse bridge. Nor does it establish that all species listed regionally for the Beoch band occur at the Cummock exposure. The correlation remains separate from the principal Middle Coal Measures sections below.

Scottish Middle Coal Measures Formation

Formation boundaries and age. The current formation is Duckmantian in the regional Carboniferous timescale. Its lower boundary is the base of the Vanderbeckei Marine Band, known locally as the Queenslie Marine Band; its upper boundary is the base of the Aegiranum Marine Band, locally called Skipsey’s Marine Band. Older accounts placed the upper division boundary at the top of Skipsey’s band. That convention must not be combined with the current definition: the marine band itself begins the overlying Scottish Upper Coal Measures Formation. A single numerical age or one formation label is therefore unsuitable for every bed described in these burns.

Coal names and revised correlations. In the 1967 regional correlation, Sloanstone is followed upwards by Minnivey, correlated with Ayr Hard, and then Chalmerston, correlated with Jewel. Higher seams include Lower Diamond, Upper Diamond, Major and Sillyhole, the latter correlated with Main, Crawfordston and Tourha’. Higher coal and ironstone horizons precede Skipsey’s Marine Band. This is a regional framework, not a claim that every seam is exposed in these streams. The 1932 account had equated Chalmerston with Ayr Hard, so historical uses of those names cannot be substituted directly into the revised scheme.

Queenslie Marine Band in Cummock Burn. The 1967 account locates this boundary marker between 1,070 and 1,100 yards, on a bearing of N30°E, from Dalmellington Mote. Regionally it occurs near the base of a mudstone interval, with marine Lingula and overlying nonmarine bivalves. The available account does not provide an independent species list or measured bed-by-bed log for this particular burn exposure. The detailed section printed alongside the discussion was measured in Pennyvenie No. 7 Pit and must not be treated as a Cummock log. The Mote-based position is also distinct from the bridge-based fossil localities unless their relationship is established in the field.

Cummock Burn: Sloanstone Coal section. The 1932 measured section was opposite Camlarg House, now a former house site. In 1949 the exposure was placed on the right bank, 400 yards (about 366 m) upstream of the manse bridge east of the village. The following eight layers are retained in the original top-down order. The imperial measurements are the historical observations; metric figures are rounded conversions. “Blaes” is the miners’ term for shaly sediment. This seam log supplies lithology and thickness, not a named fossil assemblage for each layer.

Sloanstone section: massive sandstone. The top of the published section is massive sandstone; no thickness is given.

Sloanstone section: sandy blaes. Below the sandstone are 1 foot 5 inches (about 0.43 m) of sandy shaly sediment.

Sloanstone section: soft blaes. A 2-inch (about 0.051 m) soft shaly layer separates the sandy blaes from the coal beneath.

Sloanstone section: upper bright coal. The first coal layer is 3 inches (about 0.076 m) thick.

Sloanstone section: splint coal. A contrasting splint-coal layer is also 3 inches (about 0.076 m) thick.

Sloanstone section: middle bright coal. Bright coal continues below the splint layer for 1 foot 6 inches (about 0.46 m).

Sloanstone section: stone rib. A 4-inch (about 0.10 m) stone parting divides the middle and lower bright-coal layers. The source does not specify its composition further.

Sloanstone section: lower bright coal. The lowermost layer in the published log is 2 feet 6 inches (about 0.76 m) of bright coal. No underlying bed is included in this particular section.

Mussel-bearing shales above Sloanstone. Several overlying shale bands at the 400-yard Cummock exposure contained nonmarine mussels, historically assigned to the higher part of the Modiolaris Zone. The locality description provides neither separate thicknesses for these bands nor a species list. Their fossils must be distinguished from the named historical record nearer the bridge. A biozone is a fossil-based correlation interval, not another formal rock formation.

Cummock fossil bed 100 yards above the bridge. A separate highly fossiliferous shale was recorded about 100 yards (91 m) upstream of the manse bridge. The historical identification was Anthracomya adamsi Salter, with other forms left unnamed in the locality account. In 1949 it was placed below the horizon then called Ayr Hard Coal and near the base of the Similis–pulchra Zone. Both are historical correlations. The later reassignment of coal names prevents an unqualified placement directly below the modern Ayr Hard/Minnivey seam. In 1967 the upper boundary of the Modiolaris Zone was moved to Lower Diamond Coal, replacing earlier placements between Minnivey and Chalmerston or below Ayr Hard. The fossil occurrence is useful exact-locality evidence, but its old taxonomic name and detailed position should not be silently modernised.

Black Burn: Diamond–Sillyhole interval. Between Benbeoch and Benbain, the 1932 account describes the strata between the Diamond and Sillyhole coals as well displayed, with conspicuous pale “calmy” beds. These form a separate, higher stream section. The account does not supply a complete measured stack or individual bed numbers, and its occasional spelling “Back Burn” does not identify another locality.

Black Burn fossiliferous calmstone. The specific fossil locality was placed 400 yards (about 366 m) north-west of Benbain cottage. Pale grey and white soft shale, called calmstone or “calmy metals” by miners, lies approximately 60 feet (18.3 m) below the Sillyhole Coal. That is the historical separation from the coal, not the thickness of the fossil bed. The recorded identification is Anthracomya cf. cymbula W. B. Wright. The “cf.” expresses comparison rather than a certain species determination and must be retained. These shells were discussed historically as early representatives of the librata group in South Ayrshire; this is not evidence that a new species or type specimen was discovered here. No full exact-outcrop assemblage or bed thickness is established by the locality description.

Sillyhole Coal beside igneous intrusions. Sillyhole is a coal seam, not a formation. The 1932 description records burnt coal beside a whinstone sill in Black Burn east of Benbeoch, as well as exposures in streams and on the brae north of Craigmark. “Whinstone” is a broad historical field term for hard igneous rock. Heating altered the coal after its formation; it does not change the sedimentary age of the surrounding succession or justify combining all local sills into a single body.

The four Craigmark gorges. The 1949 description distinguishes Cladwell’s Glen, the western gorge beside the road to Benquhat; an unnamed glen immediately east of Craigmark Hill; Tongue Glen, whose stream rises north of Chalmerston Hill; and Chalmerston Glen to the north-east, converging with Tongue Glen. These are separate sections. Together their documented horizons extend beyond Sillyhole Coal to Craigmark Blackband and Skipsey’s Marine Band, rather than simply repeating one coal outcrop.

Tongue Glen: coked Sillyhole Coal. In Tongue Glen, a sill described historically as coarse-textured, partly decomposed camptonitic teschenite was intruded against Sillyhole Coal. Its heat produced natural coke and conspicuous columnar jointing in the coal. A catalogued petrological specimen records burnt Sillyhole Coal and a white-trap sill at NS 476 078, with the historical locality given as 400–740 yards north-north-east of Craigmark. The specimen supports this local contact relationship, but has no recorded collection date. The historical petrographic description should not be applied indiscriminately to other intrusions in the area.

Cladwell’s Glen: Craigmark Blackband section. The 1949 exposure was on the west side of the gorge, at the top of the bank, about 100 yards north of an oblique bend in the Benquhat road near the hilltop. The source records four layers in the following top-down order. Craigmark Blackband is a high-level ironstone in this succession and must not be confused with the older Dalmellington Blackband of the Lower Coal Measures.

Craigmark Blackband section: upper coal. The uppermost recorded layer is 9 inches (about 0.23 m) of coal.

Craigmark Blackband section: fossil-bearing irony shale. Below it are 2 feet (about 0.61 m) of irony shale containing fossils described as “entomostraca”, a broad historical term for small crustaceans. No species-level identification is supplied. Similar shale was recorded at the old ironstone mines in Tongue Glen, about 800 yards north of the village; material at those mine sites should not be mistaken for a newly measured natural bed.

Craigmark Blackband section: ironstone. The blackband ironstone itself is 6 inches (about 0.15 m) thick in this log.

Craigmark Blackband section: basal coal. The lowermost recorded layer is a thin coal, 1 inch (about 0.025 m) thick.

Tongue Glen: beds beneath Skipsey’s Marine Band. The marine horizon was placed approximately 60 feet (18.3 m) above Craigmark Blackband. Immediately beneath its fossiliferous limestone, the 1949 section records about 20 feet (6.10 m) of shale with sandstone ribs and nodular fireclay. These are the underlying sedimentary beds, not 20 feet of marine limestone. The account does not subdivide their individual thicknesses further.

Scottish Upper Coal Measures Formation: Skipsey’s boundary beds

Skipsey’s Marine Band and the formation boundary. The local Skipsey name corresponds to the Aegiranum Marine Band. Its base marks the modern transition from the Scottish Middle to Scottish Upper Coal Measures formations. The Tongue Glen description includes the marine limestone and its overlying blue shale; it is therefore misleading to place the entire section within the Middle Coal Measures or assign every bed the same Duckmantian age. This account does not assume that the lithological summary resolves every fossil-defined detail of the basal contact.

Tongue section: fossiliferous dark limestone. The logged limestone is 1 foot (about 0.305 m) thick, above the underlying shale, sandstone ribs and nodular fireclay. It provides direct evidence of a fossiliferous marine horizon in Tongue Glen. The locality paragraph does not specify a full fauna; district-wide marine species lists should not be transferred wholesale to this outcrop.

Tongue section: blue shale. Above the dark limestone, the historical section records 10 feet (about 3.05 m) of blue shale. The three-part log therefore reads downwards: blue shale, fossiliferous dark limestone, then about 20 feet of shale with sandstone ribs and nodular fireclay. The 1949 account describes several high-bank exposures and locates its best section about 600 yards upstream from the point where the ironstone reached stream level. Those are historical exposure observations, not a present recommendation to climb the banks.

Intrusive architecture across the separate sections. The 1932 account traced an upper sill related to Corbie Craigs into Cummock Burn east of Camlarg House. It separately described a dark, fine-grained whinstone, termed kylite, capping Craigmark Hill and neighbouring hills. At southern Craigmark Hill this latter sill overlies Skipsey’s Marine Band; at its northern margin Chalmerston Coal was proved 14 fathoms (about 25.6 m) below the surface. The memoir used the differing stratigraphic positions beneath the comparatively continuous sill to infer that some faulting pre-dated intrusion. These relationships are structural context, not a thickness for a fossil-bearing sedimentary unit. They must remain distinct from the coal-contact sill in Tongue Glen.

Using the geology responsibly. The strongest fossil evidence concerns particular shale bands, the Black Burn calmstone, Craigmark Blackband’s crustacean-bearing shale and the Tongue marine limestone. Historical species names, modern formation boundaries and individual outcrop positions carry different levels of certainty. The 2008 field guide also recorded general plant remains, but the reviewed exact-locality accounts do not establish a species list for them. Photographs, bed descriptions and careful location records are useful; none of these geological records grants permission to excavate banks, disturb channels or take specimens.

References

Simpson and colleagues (1932): The economic geology of the Ayrshire Coalfields, area IV, pp. 121–124 and 128

Eyles and colleagues (1949): Geology of Central Ayrshire, second edition, pp. 92–93

Mykura, with Calver and Wilson (1967): The Upper Carboniferous rocks of south-west Ayrshire, pp. 49 and 55–57, and figure 6

BGS Lexicon: Scottish Coal Measures Group

BGS Lexicon: Scottish Lower Coal Measures Formation

BGS Lexicon: Scottish Middle Coal Measures Formation and current boundary definitions

Waters and colleagues (2011): A lithostratigraphical framework for the Carboniferous successions of northern Great Britain

BGS petrology collection: burnt Sillyhole Coal and white-trap sill, Tongue Glen

SAFETY

Low water improves visibility but does not make a burn safe. Avoid visits during or after heavy rain, when rising water, strong currents and obscured footing can prevent a safe return. Do not enter a channel or cross water to reach a fossil, and turn back if the approach requires a hazardous descent.

The Craigmark gorges are deep, and wet rock, algae, loose shale and unstable banks present fall and slip hazards. Stay away from undercut banks, overhangs, steep edges, abandoned mine openings and old workings. Do not enter active forestry, restoration or other work areas. Historic restoration records are not a safety certificate for an individual route.

Plan a return route, carry a charged phone and offline mapping, and let someone know where you are going. This is not a recommended outing for children. If the geology cannot be viewed from a stable, permitted position, leave it for another visit.

EQUIPMENT

Carry an OS 1:25,000 map or equivalent offline mapping, suitable footwear with good grip, waterproof clothing, a hand lens, camera, scale and notebook. A walking pole can help on permitted paths, but it is no substitute for avoiding deep water and unstable ground.

For specimens that you have permission to collect and retain, bring soft wrapping, labels and small rigid boxes to protect fragile shale. Pack separate localities separately. This guide does not recommend a pick or digging tools for the streambanks.

CLEANING AND TREATING

Soft shale can split or disintegrate as it dries, so support permitted specimens during transport and let wet material dry slowly at room temperature. Start with minimal dry brushing under magnification. Do not soak friable shale or try to open every bedding plane: a shell impression and its counterpart can be lost in one uncontrolled split.

For hard limestone or ironstone, avoid forcing the matrix away where fossil and rock break together. Do not use household acids, bleach, wire brushes or varnish. If a specimen is unstable or potentially important, leave it unprepared and seek specialist advice before consolidation or mechanical preparation. Preserve the label and any matching counterpart with it.

IDENTIFY YOUR FINDS

Need help identifying a fossil? Share clear photos, where you found it and its size with the community.

FURTHER READING

Geological Survey (1932): Ayrshire Coalfields, Area IV
Geological Survey (1949): Geology of Central Ayrshire
Mykura (1967): Upper Carboniferous rocks of south-west Ayrshire
BGS Lexicon: Scottish Middle Coal Measures Formation
NatureScot: Scottish Fossil Code

ACCESS RIGHTS

These are historical stream exposures, not a managed collecting site. Scottish recreational access rights do not confer ownership of fossils. Follow the Scottish Fossil Code: establish permission from the appropriate mineral-rights owner for collecting and retaining specimens, including loose fossils; permission from the landowner or occupier may also be needed. No present collecting permission for these particular exposures is established by this guide.

Benbeoch SSSI lies nearby, and regional wetland designations changed in 2025 with the creation of Doon Valley Wetlands SSSI. The precise relationship of the individual burn exposures and approaches to current protected-site boundaries has not been resolved here. Check the relevant boundaries and collecting conditions through NatureScot SiteLink or NatureScot before visiting. If consent is required, arrange it through the appropriate owner and authority; an absence of signs is not permission.

6a4bfbf50b99eb839741fb99dca95014f77f693a_hq.jpgScotland’s fossil resource is at risk of abuse and damage, and so we must all safeguard and manage fossil collecting to ensure its survival for future generations. For this reason it is VITAL you read and adhere to the Scottish Fossil Code for ALL sites in Scotland. 

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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