Safe window: 12:30pm – 3:30pm
Leave the beach by 3:30pm — the tide will cut off your route back.
Big tide today (spring tide) — more beach exposed, but it comes back in fast.
A big 1.3 m low tide falls mid-afternoon.
Low tide: 2:30pm (1.3 m) · Wind up to 36 km/h · Waves 0.5 m
Safe window: 1:19pm – 4:19pm
Leave the beach by 4:19pm — the tide will cut off your route back.
Big tide today (spring tide) — more beach exposed, but it comes back in fast.
A big 1.1 m low tide falls mid-afternoon.
Low tide: 2:59am (1.0 m), 3:19pm (1.1 m) · Wind up to 26 km/h · Waves 0.4 m
Safe window: 4:32am – 4:46am
Leave the beach by 4:46am — the tide will cut off your route back.
Big tide today (spring tide) — more beach exposed, but it comes back in fast.
A big 0.9 m low tide falls first thing. Daylight cuts the collecting window to under 45 minutes, so don't plan a long session.
Low tide: 3:46am (0.9 m), 4:04pm (1.1 m) · Wind up to 17 km/h · Waves 0.2 m
Safe window: 4:34am – 5:31am
Leave the beach by 5:31am — the tide will cut off your route back.
Big tide today (spring tide) — more beach exposed, but it comes back in fast.
A big 1.1 m low tide falls first thing.
Low tide: 4:31am (1.1 m), 4:48pm (1.3 m) · Wind up to 17 km/h · Waves 0.3 m
Safe window: 4:35am – 6:13am
Leave the beach by 6:13am — the tide will cut off your route back.
Big tide today (spring tide) — more beach exposed, but it comes back in fast.
A big 1.4 m low tide falls first thing.
Low tide: 5:13am (1.4 m), 5:30pm (1.8 m) · Wind up to 19 km/h · Waves 0.4 m
Safe window: 4:37am – 6:54am
Leave the beach by 6:54am — the tide will cut off your route back.
Low tide falls first thing, though it is not an especially big one. No recent storms, so expect a picked-over beach.
Low tide: 5:54am (2.0 m), 6:11pm (2.3 m) · Wind up to 17 km/h · Waves 0.3 m
Tuesday 21 July
Quiet day
Safe window: 4:38am – 7:36am
Leave the beach by 7:36am — the tide will cut off your route back.
Low tide falls first thing, though it is not an especially big one. No recent storms, so expect a picked-over beach.
Low tide: 6:36am (2.6 m), 6:54pm (2.9 m) · Wind up to 16 km/h · Waves 0.3 m
Boulder-hop at low water and check every flat slab — large ammonite impressions are the classic find. The bone bed at the point occasionally yields dark, polished fragments in the loose gravel; anything still in rock stays.
Ammonite impressions here can be dinner-plate size, showing as coiled ridges on fallen grey-blue slabs. 'Devil's toenails' (Gryphaea) are thick, curved oyster shells lying loose in the gravel. Free identification: photograph your find for the enquiry service at Amgueddfa Cymru — National Museum Cardiff.
This coast is a protected site (SSSI). What does that mean?
Allowed: Loose fossils from the beach and foreshore may be kept for personal collections.
Never allowed: No hammering or digging into the cliffs or the wave-cut ledges anywhere on the Glamorgan Heritage Coast.
Important finds: Report significant finds (this coast produced the Welsh dinosaur Dracoraptor) to Amgueddfa Cymru — National Museum Cardiff.
Rules can change — check locally before you collect.