HELPING TO CLEAN UP OUR COAST AND COUNTRYSIDE
This has been a very busy weekend for me as I spent most of my time doing beach cleans as part of World Clean Up Day. As a member of Plastic Free Communities in West Somerset, there were organised beach cleans at Minehead (Saturday morning) and Watchet (Sunday morning) which I joined in with and each day had a good turnout of volunteers willing to help out. Both events started with a 100m sweep of a section of beach to look for all types of litter and micro plastics as well as a general litter pick of the local area. As always, there was plenty to collect, especially cigarette butts where the majority of smokers do not realise how damaging the discarded cigarette is to the marine environment.
On Saturday afternoon, I made my first ever trip to Stolford Beach to see what litter I might find there. Once on the beach, immediately I found plenty of plastic and a different type of litter I'm used to finding. A couple of large cable ties but then so many more plus two pairs of safety goggles and remains of a tape measure. There were other items which seem more connected to the construction industry which I don't normally find on the West Somerset coastline. It maybe a coincidence but with Hinkley Point just a mile down the coast from here, I guess that might be the problem. I struggled back to the car with my first haul before going back to get a couple of other pieces I wanted to get before the high tide took them away. I'm hoping to get back there next weekend to continue along the coast from where I left off. Today (Sunday) after lunch, I decided to have an afternoon walk at Dunster Beach along towards Minehead. I didn't plan it to be a beach clean so didn't take my litter picking equipment but all the same, made sure I put a couple of sacks in my pocket. I walked along the edge of the incoming tide picking up a plastic bottle as I walked down the pebble bank. a bit further on, I saw spotted something floating in on the tide and saw it was a worker's helmet. I had to wade in to get it so carried it along with me towards Minehead and kept seeing other items along the high tide mark o on my return had to get a sack from my pocket and do an unplanned litter pick. Another thing I found was a huge amount of tangled fishing line which I collected up. By the time I got back to Dunster Beach, I had a sack full of plastic which will be sorted and recycled by the children at school in their marine environment study coming up in a couple of weeks.
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Out on the beach again, the warm and calm weather recently attracted people to enjoy an evening barbecue. The majority of people are responsible in removing all trace afterwards. While some choose to build a small fire using driftwood from the beach, the most popular choice is a disposable barbecue which are cheap and easy to ignite. However, these can easily leave lasting damage when used irresponsibly as the unit will be hot enough to set fire to the surface they are on unless it is a fireproof surface. The above photos show 2 local incidents at the weekend where somebody chose to use the unit on a wooden bench causing damage which luckily wasn't more severe. If this had set fire to the bench, the fire could have spread to surrounding area. Sadly, this happens too often during summer months destroying huge areas of countryside as well as wildlife. The other photo shows a disposable barbecue left on the beach along with leftover food, cans and bottles. I collected it all up and disposed of it at home but I do wonder why these people think it's fine to walk away from it for somebody else to clear up or worse still, let the tide take it away.
If you do use one of these disposable barbecues, never use in the countryside. Many areas have banned their use. If using on the beach, make sure it can't set fire to anything nearby. When finished, pour water onto the whole unit and, when cool, take it away along with all other rubbish and leave the site as you found it. Back from my holiday and back at work, my spare time is still dedicated to litter picking whenever I can. My first visit to the beach was at Blue Anchor and walking along the shore towards Dunster with my litter picking equipment. As well as the usual pieces of marine litter washed up, I found the remains of four helium filled foil balloons all in a very short distance of each other. Only one of these still had the ribbon attached which is an added danger to wildlife. During my holiday beach cleans, I found plenty of these balloons washed up including some huge number shaped remains lying on the shore. Roy Beal, whose story I wrote about in a previous post, saw plenty of balloons floating around in the sea like jellyfish during his solo kayak challenge from John O'Groats to Land End earlier in the summer.
Last month, the Isle Of Man brought in a law banning the sale of these balloons which have no place in our environment. The UK government also need to impose the same law as soon as possible. |
AuthorBorn in West Somerset, I have always been proud of where I live and want everyone else to enjoy it too! Archives
September 2022
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