Abstract
The seaside is both a physical space and a sociocultural construct. It is a place dominated by humans and occupied by commercial and non-commercial leisure experiences designed for their pleasure. Yet the seaside is also a space of complex, fragile, ecosystems inhabited, both temporarily and permanently, by multiple species. Situated against this backdrop, this chapter explores how some animals are identified as belonging at the seaside, while others are excluded from it by humans. Exclusion and inclusion are constantly evolving concepts driven by contest and conflict between different, both human and animal, interest groups. Discussions of these concepts in the chapter are linked to animal-human relations, animal welfare, and animal rights, set within an animal-centric philosophy that recognizes animals as sentient beings. The chapter draws on global examples, incorporating remote, wild, and urban seasides of varying desirability to humans. In doing so, it discusses many wild and domesticated animals at both species and individual levels. The chapter calls for a sustainable future for the use of the seaside as a site of human leisure where an animal-centric approach is taken to animal rights and welfare, for those who live and visit the seaside.