Forums Forums Wirral Information Ask - Wiki Wirral The 'fossil' shells at Marine Lake, West Kirby

Hi
while walking around the Marine Lake at West Kirby yesterday, we saw white shells incorporated into the rocks that make up the perimiter/walkway of the lake, they were on the Dee estuary side. We wouldn't have called them 'fossils' as the shells were still visibly the white calcium that they are made of. They are shells trapped in solid rock.

And this is what caught my attention: how many thousands of years does it take the sands/sediment/silt to become rock? hundreds of thousand? milions? hundred millions? Yet these shells still hadn't broken down.

I had hoped to have found a web-site that explained these stones but I couldn't find anything after a bit of searching. Has anyone else come upon them? or can tell me about them? Where did the stones that make up and surround this perimiter come from?

Many thanks

Are you certain they are not just part of the concrete defence wall?

You know the marine lake, there's a walkway right around it. On the outer side towards the sea, the council have dropped big stones. These shells/fossils are embedded in some of those.

I mainly saw them on the side facing the Dee.

I'm not talking about the promenade where there's benches and people park their cars, it's the little pathway around the lake.