By Jayson Byles, forager & chef · Updated August 2026
Coastal foraging is the gathering of wild food where the land meets the sea — shore plants, seaweeds, and for the experienced, shellfish. Marine foraging is its wet half: harvesting food that lives in the sea itself, which on a Scottish shore means seaweed above all. The two blur into each other on any real walk down a beach, and Scotland — with over 11,000 miles of coastline and some of the cleanest inshore water in Europe — is one of the best places on earth to learn them.
What can you actually forage on a Scottish shore?
Seaweeds are the honest answer for beginners: abundant, generous in season, and uniquely forgiving — no seaweed growing on the British shore is truly poisonous. Start with the five in our field guide, then go deeper in the Fife Seaweed Library: dabberlocks, pepper dulse, sea spaghetti and sugar kelp. Coastal plants follow — the greens and herbs of the strandline and dunes, each with its season. Shellfish are real food too, but they are their own discipline: water quality, seasons and identification all matter in ways that can hurt you, which is why we teach seaweed first and treat shellfish with respect.
Is the east coast good for foraging?
It is the quiet secret. The west gets the fame, but the east coast’s big spring tides uncover enormous stretches of rocky shore, the North Sea water along the East Neuk is clean and clear, and the low-tide platform between Elie and Kingsbarns carries every species a beginner could want — within an hour of Edinburgh and twenty minutes of St Andrews. Our whole workshop calendar is built on those tides.
The three things to learn before anything else
- Tides. The shore opens on the falling tide around each new and full moon and closes fast behind you — learn to read them. Read A Year on the Shore for the rhythm of it.
- The law and the ethic. Hand-gathering for your own table is a long-standing tradition on the Scottish shore; take small amounts, and always cut, never pull, so the plant regrows.
- Safety. The sea does not negotiate. Our free A.L.L.W.E.T. framework — Ally, Location, Lunch, Weather, Equipment, Tides — is the six-rule habit every workshop runs on.
Is there a marine foraging course in Scotland?
Yes — ours, on the East Neuk shore. The Seaweed Taster is the 90-minute introduction; On the Rocks is the full marine foraging course in all but name: four hours working the spring-tide low with Jayson Byles — forager, chef and former commercial seaweed harvest manager — ending in a five-course wild menu cooked over fire on the beach. A guided low tide compresses months of cautious solo trial into one morning.