#beach plastic

I am so bad at actually updating my own blogs lol. I will try harder. Likewise, I've not been on the beach much last few months because of the heat wave making it too hot. It also means the beach is busy and hard to pass through. If I wasn't working early mornings I would just go in the mornings.

As an apology have some washed up deadly balloons from over the years. 'Portuguese man o' war' are potentially deadly even when washed up so be careful, best to report to beach patrol if they do wash up because when there is one there is usually more.

They look like jellyfish, but they're actually a siphonophore! A colonial organism that resembles a jellyfish.

Inktober 2020 - Day 10 - ‘Hope’  

I saw David Attenborough’s ‘A life on our planet’ (or frankly ‘ David Attenborough‘s witness statement’ as that's what he actually calls it in the film) recently. While it was nothing new to me, it was a film I think everyone should see really. Because Sir David is excellent at not only highlighting the urgency of us needing to fix our planet, he offers hope in how it can be easy to change this is we take small steps (and bigger ones to oppose those who are making the big and bad choices).

My home town of Worthing has wind turbines off the coast. They’ve unobtrusive and somewhat pretty (and not nearly as visible as I’ve drawn them here, but lollipop sticks coming out the sea doesn’t look as great).  But you’d be amazed by the amount who opposed to such things. When I briefly lived in the tourist trap of Bournemouth- the locals opposed such wind turbines off the coast because  “It would be a blot on the landscape and hurt tourism”. Because windmills 8 miles out to sea may blow the tourist away right? Idiots. So they were not built in Bournemouth and instead they were built near Worthing and Brighton, because there are more green minded people living there and in council seats (and one main reasons I was pleased to move back home). Fighting for such things is a really important step we all need to do, because it’s one of the main things we will need in the future.

My own photo of said ‘blOt On THe lAnDScAPE.’

The other thing I do personally (along with many other locals) is pick litter off the beach when we can. I often walk home via the beach. It’s a longer route but it always clams me down. I often see some sweet nature and I take the rubbish I find off the beach and put it into a bin (next step is what we do with our land fills, but like David said- little steps). The object  being grabbed by the litter picker is an inhaler that was home to set of deceased goose barnacles. This is based on something I once found myself.

There is a metaphor here I’m sure.

NEW YEAR RESOLUTION - POST HERE MORE.

I have more than enough picture of the things I find litter picking on my local beach; I just need to get into the habit.

Until then, have a load of festive themed things I have found over the years! With so much waste the season produces; it's amazing I've not found more.

Many sparkling things; Tinsel seaweed, a skinned robin, a deer whelk and more!

Once found what I suspect is part of a deer antler, complete with golden string on a 'branch; which likely held a decoration at some point.

Also found a piece of a Christmas light decoration originating from a cargo spill:

I even acquired an entire wreath. I should do something with it; i have since added a ton of fake plants i have found to the 'antler' in the past.

This is unsurprising, over the summer I do find a ridiculous amount of toys; especially the sand shapes. Luckily most are in good enough condition to clean up and give to charity (or at the moment give to my little niece <3 ).

But the toys are often just £1, and I'm like; if people are willing to spend a few quid to buy then just leave behind; why not just have a cheap loan service instead? And raise the price for the ones you want to take home? If it cost more; maybe people will look after them better. The extra cost could go to beach cleaning services and waste collectors.

Apologies been neglecting this blog some, but I've finally been sorting through my old photos, so I plan to slowly upload all my old pictures and finds and slowly reach today so I can do more weekly uploads of the things left behind.

I've always picked up rubbish, but I think the 'clean up' urge came about when returning to my home sea-side home town after living in another sea-side down for a long while; Bournemouth.

Bournemouth has a serious rubbish problem on their beaches, but that's because it's heavily touristy in the summer, never enough bins (or people caring to clean up after themselves) and afterwards they just pave over the rubbish with more sand. So when the sand erodes, you can find layers and layers of plastic pollution.

I'd pick up what I could, but at the time I was so busy and there was so much of the smaller bits of plastic, but I did what I could and thought maybe I should photograph it:

Little pockets of plastic. I was a bit rubbish at uploading online at the time though, and my camera wasn't perfect.

I do find tons of those little plastic soy sauce fish; but I like photographing this one. Artificial fish in a sea of artifacts.

Then because I have a little bit of a hoarder/collector mentality, I collected what I thought was interesting, could reuse or use in shots again.

(apologies for the rubbish photo, it's old)

Most of these bits I've either:

Donated (like the skull ring and water pistol grenade, which just needed the sand cleaned out of it)

Reused (the caustic sticker I stuck to a sketchbook, the bits of fake plant top right I used in a bigger plastic plant project I've been building up and the glow in the dark starts I've stuck to a shelf at the moment lol)

Or I still have in a box of 'treasures' to repurpose into...something. Like that googly eye with the pink hair or that yellow football shoe that came from a keyring.

It's stuff that caught my eye in a sea of discarded plastic.

I never figured out what that silly band (blue top left) was meant to be.

Stuck down, I THINK it's a ghost.

Went to the Brighton Sealife centre yesterday with my sister, brother in law, nice and husbundo @scifer for the animal crossing cross over and belated birthday for my litle nice.

Lots of fun, and I basically went around every cut out and dress up of the animal crossing character to be photoed basically doing this:

LOOK CELEBRITIES:

AS WELL AS

✧˖°⊹ ࣪ ˖⋆.˚⟡ ࣪ ˖ COLIN ˚⟡ ࣪ ˖⊹ ࣪ ˖⋆✧˖°

Lots of stuff about plastic and supporting local species, and my fave was this one eyed friend.

It's all good stuff. Have some photos, I had more but photo flash hurts a lot of the animals eyes and my phone is rather rubbish without flash.

I used to have an actual good phone camera. I swear my current one is more invested in dust particles than actually focusing on what's in front of me.

Have some more artistic beach toys.

DON'T FORGET TO SAAAAAAVE.

Yet alas, no one saved the floppy disk. :<