Shark Teeth on Hilton Head: Where and How to Look

On the island

uncommon, and mostly small

Where to look

shell piles at low tide

What to look for

a shiny, dark gray or black triangle

Sure thing

a boat trip to Shark Tooth Island

You can find shark teeth on Hilton Head, but not many. The island’s beaches are wide and sandy, and the teeth that wash up here are few and mostly small. Your best chance is to sift the piles of broken shell at the tide line on a falling or low tide. For a real haul, take a boat to Shark Tooth Island in the Savannah River, or drive about an hour and a quarter north to Hunting Island State Park.

How to Spot a Shark Tooth

Fossil shark teeth are usually gunmetal gray to black and look smooth and matte, and some have a hint of blue. That blue tint is the quickest way to tell a tooth from a piece of fossil oyster shell, which is the same dark color. Look for a small triangle, often with a darker, wider root at the top. Very dark teeth are the oldest, often millions of years old, and they are the ones you are most likely to find. Beige or pearly white teeth fell out of a shark much more recently.

Sharks shed and regrow teeth all their lives, so a single shark leaves thousands behind. That is why teeth turn up at all on a beach where you never see a shark.

Where to Find Shark Teeth on Hilton Head

• The shell line at low tide. Walk the strip of crushed shell the last high tide left behind and look closely, a small patch at a time. Teeth hide among the shell pieces, not on the clean sand.

• Fish Haul Beach Park. The island’s best shelling beach, on Port Royal Sound. At low tide the sand flats and shell beds there give you the most ground to search.

• After storms and beach renourishment. Rough seas and sand pumped in from offshore both bring up new shell, and with it the odd tooth. Check the shell line in the days after a storm.

• Any time of year. There is no shark tooth season. Rangers say the tide matters far more than the month.

You may dig in the sand while you search, but the Town asks that holes be no deeper than 12 inches and that you fill them back in before you leave, so nesting sea turtles and other beachgoers don’t fall into them. Low tide comes twice a day; check the Hilton Head tide times before you go.

Shark Tooth Island by Boat

Shark Tooth Island, also called Jones Island, sits in the Savannah River and was built up from sand and mud dredged out of the shipping channel. The dredging brought up old seabed full of fossils, so its beach is scattered with shark teeth, including the odd megalodon tooth. The island can only be reached by boat. Outside Hilton Head runs shark tooth trips by boat from Shelter Cove Marina through the tidal creeks toward the Savannah River, and people also find bits of pottery, whale bone and petrified wood.

Better Beaches for Shark Teeth Nearby

• Hunting Island State Park. About an hour and a quarter north, past Beaufort. Rangers there say teeth and shells collect around the sand pillars at low tide. The boneyard, with its fallen trees, is the poorest spot.

• Sands Beach, Port Royal. Rangers call it the best place in Beaufort County for shark teeth: a small beach at the end of Port Royal’s boardwalk, about 45 minutes from the island.

• Folly Beach, near Charleston. Often called the top shark tooth beach in South Carolina, about two and a half hours’ drive.