lifeguard tower 26 - Ocean Park, Santa Monica CA
trash collected for 20 min.
3.2 pounds collected
722.5 pounds total
COMMUNITY COUNT - Day 109
Dean Miya
trash collected for 20 min.
3.2 pounds
666.4 pounds total
Daily Ocean combined total - 1,388.9
This is the lifeguard's water bottle that was sitting out on the deck as he was shuttering up 26 for the night. My first thought was that it would be great to take a picture of it, but I hadn't even seen the RISE ABOVE PLASTICS logo that was on his KLEEN KANTEEN stainless steel bottle. The discovery was a huge bonus to me. Surfrider's RISE ABOVE PLASTICS campaign is tremendous. You can get involved where ever you live, coastal or not. Check it out!
The Wake Project interviewed me about The Daily Ocean recently. I hadn't heard of their organization before they contacted me, but now I feel the need to pass along a link to them so that you too can learn about their amazing efforts.
"WAKE IS AN AWARENESS INITIATIVE THAT SEEKS TO EDUCATE PEOPLE ABOUT THE IMPORTANCE OF SHARKS, RAYS AND TUNAS TO OUR PLANET'S FRAGILE OCEAN ECOSYSTEM. WE SPEAK FOR THOSE WHO CANNOT SPEAK FOR THEMSELVES."
Thank you to the Wake Project for taking an interest in The Daily Ocean.
What kind of strange plastic bottle is this?
This startling fact is from the Britta Filter For Good PSA collaboration with the Sundance Channel:
"LAST YEAR THE USA USED ENOUGH PLASTIC WATER BOTTLES TO STRETCH AROUND THE EARTH OVER 190 TIMES."
My friend Danielle's short film about her cigarette butt beach cleanup in Wrightsville Beach N.C. is one of three winners at this year's Sundance Festival. Here is a great site to find out more about all three, the talented filmmakers who made them, and the inspiring stories that sparked the short films.
Yay Danielle! What a pleasure it has been to see this grow! You are tremendous!
I want to thank Dean for coming out with me tonight. It was over nine months ago that he contacted me for the first time when he say this blog after recognizing the stretch of beach as the very spot that he surfed at most often. Since then, he has joined me several times, while also volunteering for Habitat for Humanity, Sea Shepard, and spending weeks down in the Gulf this past year getting up close to all the devastation. He inspires me. When you mention how cool it is that he does all of this, he simply says, "It can't be about me all the time."
We were talking about how depressing beach cleanups can be. As you can see from the pictures, the tide was waaaaay out, revealing a plethora of plastics and other soggy trash. We agreed after a minute or two that cleaning it up has to start somewhere. And further agreed that we find it very distressing that animals mistake this trash for food.
Many jellyfish were stranded by the receding tide last night. I nearly picked up a jelly instead of the plastic next to it. They looked identical to me for a moment.
Garen and I are buying our plane tickets to Chile this week. We leave the 10th of March from LA to fly to Chile to join a 5 Gyres expedition where Garen will research the effects of plastic micro-pollutants on plankton. If you would like to join an expedition with 5 Gyres find all the info here. If you would like to learn more about the one that we will be joining, and why we want to go with them, check out our story here. Hey, check out both if you feel inspired too! We hope you do.
