The freezing cold conditions were unable to deter a large team of volunteers to clean the beach in the teeth of a Siberian easterly wind at Fisher’s Hill yesterday (Sunday).
A group of 35 volunteers, including some taking part for the first time, made what was described by organisers Beach Buddies as “a fantastic job” when they completely cleared one of the beaches in the Isle of Man most regularly affected by rubbish.
“It was a wonderful job and a great turn-out, with some more new volunteers, and particularly as it was Mother's Day,” said Bill Dale of Beach Buddies.
A feature of the clean-up, with 35 bags collected, was a large number of big plastic containers - the sort used for engine oil. During the hour-long session, the volunteers collected 20 of the containers, together with the remains of two ancient lobster pots and plenty of rope, fishing gear and, as always, huge amounts of plastic, plastic, plastic!!
There was also plenty of fishing line found along the half mile stretch of beach, which is one of the important items to remove. Bill Dale added, “The line can become entangled in the legs of seabirds, sometimes leading to their ultimate death if they can't remove it, because their flying can be restricted and they cannot get away quickly from predators.
“Small plastic bags were also numerous, and these again are important to remove, as they can be mistaken in the water for jellyfish, and jellyfish feed on the same plankton as basking sharks - consequently, the picture last summer of a basking shark with a plastic bag stuck on the end of its nose. And that's without knowing how many plastic bags actually end up in a shark's stomach.”
There will be a break from Big Team Beach Cleans next weekend, and they will be back in action in a fortnight's time on the beach at Smeale, meeting at the car park at the far end at 10.30am.
Photo - The collection of bags at Fisher's Hill (Courtesy of Tim Cross)
