Beach-goers were shocked to discover dozens of dead sea creatures strewn across the pebbles this morning.

Fish, sharks and rays were among some of the washed-up marine life discovered near Hampton Pier in Herne Bay today.

Skate, smooth-hound sharks, dogfish and thornback rays were also found.

A Canterbury City Council spokeman said: "The view of our foreshore team is that this looks like typical fishing bycatch or discards; skate carcasses that have been winged (edible part removed) with dogfish and possibly small smoothhound.

"Possible explanations are that they have been thrown over the side of a boat and washed up in the same area, or have been thrown over the seafront railings having been beach caught or processed on land.

"We do not believe it to be connected to water quality, as there would be other evidence of this and we have not had any bad water quality results or even warnings recently."

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