Thousands of starfish strand on beach in Cumbria, UK

© Gary McKeating
Starfish on the beach

    

Photographer Gary McKeating made the discovery on Monday night when he headed to Harrington beach to take pictures of the sunset. He was horrified to come across what he estimates were around 2,000 starfish on the sands.

Experts say the high tides, which drop down low, coupled with strong currents resulted in the sea creatures being washed ashore.

Mr McKeating said: "There were a lot of kids down there and they told me to go and look at the starfish.

"They were on a sandbank right in front of the pier. I was very careful where I stood because I didn't know if they were dead or alive - I've never seen anything like it."

Dr Emily Baxter, marine conservation officer for Cumbria Wildlife Trust, believes the sea creatures would have been dead, as they cannot survive for long out of the water.

"This isn't as unusual as you might think," she said. "However, they tend to wash up in the winter when we have big storms. There were some quite big tides on Monday, probably the biggest we'll get this year, and the strong currents and high tide will have brought them into shore.

"They tend to aggregate in large numbers, especially when there is a feeding source."

The starfish have suction cups on their feet which they use to grip onto hard items such as rocks and muscle shells. Dr Baxter said they would have struggled to find anything suitable to cling onto to keep them from washing ashore, as they would have been surrounded by sand.

A spokesman for the Lake District Coast Aquarium, in Maryport, which has starfish, said instances like this happened around two to three times a year.

"Nobody really has a definite answer why it happens but there are a few theories," he said. "One is that it's due to the stormy weather, which can't have been the case here as we have had nice weather recently.

"The other is that they all come together for breeding and the tides are really high at the moment and drop down quite low, so they have maybe been caught by the tide retreating lower than it usually does, resulting in them becoming stranded."

Millions of common starfish live in British seas. About the size of a hand, they are pinky orange when alive but turn a bright orange when dry.