Day 252 - Feb. 7, 2012

lifeguard tower 26 - Ocean Park, Santa Monica

trash collected for 20 min. 

1.5 pounds

938.5 pounds total 

A Hippo? A blue, poisonous, amazon tree frog? I don't even know if such a critter exists, but this guy wasn't left to wallow in the sand. 

I got the chance to tour a local environmental organization in Kenya called, "Local Ocean." They do great work educating the community about sea turtles. Sea Turtles mistake plastics like the one above for their preferred food, jelly fish. Local Ocean rehabilitates injured turtles and releases more back to the Indian Ocean every year. 

A strange side effect of Somali Pirates off the coast is a recovering fishery. Big Bill Fishes are back in force off the Kenyan coast. 

Here's hoping there's also a positive surge for sea turtles. Although, I spent two days in the water and didn't see one turtle except the juvenile Loggerhead they invited me to help release. 

A minuscule amount of rain fell yesterday, but I still stayed out of the water this morning. The surf was pumping, and while I'd love to play in the storm surge, I bet the churning action of the waves stirred up all the bacteria from the run-off into a nice, soupy mess. It's easy to forget looking at this photograph that a pulsing metropolis perches right behind it. Los Angeles is 8 million people strong. 

Day 251 - Feb. 4, 2012

lifeguard tower 26 - Ocean Park, Santa Monica CA

trash collected for 20 min. 

1 pound

937 pounds total 

Famed race car driver, Leilani Munter is raising funds to drive a Cove themed car in the Daytona race this Feb. 18th. If she succeeds, the car will be the first ocean awareness themed car to race...ever. Give her a hand? Learn more here. 

As I was photographing this bandaid when a man stopped to ask, "Documenting medical waste?"

"Yes," I said. 

He looked puzzled. "For who?" 

"For me." I explained that I wrote the Daily Ocean, and some of the details. 

He seemed surprised. "Thanks. I'll check it out." 

Part of the reason I find collecting on the beach at sunset effective is that many people out on a walk to  enjoy the end of the day will stop, ask me what I'm up to, and I get to explain. 

Simple, easy, and I hope effective. 

My friends and I got tickets to see Cirque Du Soliel this Friday. When you buy your tickets, you can choose to donate to 1 Drop:
"ONE DROP is a charitable organization that develops integrated, innovative projects with an international scope, in which water plays a central role as a creative force in generating positive, sustainable effects for local and foreign populations and in the fight against poverty." 


I'm impressed with Cirque's efforts. They are supporting Heal the Bay's Aquarium while in town, as well as taking it one step further to funnel needed donations into international projects involving water. 

Day 250 - Feb. 2, 2012

lifeguard tower 26 - Ocean Park, Santa Monica CA

trash collected for 20 min.

1.5 pounds collected

936 pounds total

Cirque Du Soleil is in Santa Monica with their new show, OVO. Some friends and I have been discussing when to go. Heal the Bay just released on its site that Cirque is sponsoring 5 field trips (busing and all to and from schools) during their stay in our city to the HTB Aquarium. And every Sunday in Feb. you can go to the Heal the Bay Aquarium at the Santa Monica Pier for FREE courtesy of Cirque. Okay, I'm definitely getting tickets to see OVO. 

Ever wonder what a balloon popping underwater sounds like? No? Me neither. But there is a very cool website that records the underwater world, and then lets us listen. The U.S. Navy isn't too thrilled. Check out Humpback Whale song, and even the eerie sound of the Japanese Earthquake rumbling across the sea floor as it conquered the tsunami at listentothedeep.com

Night 250's beach cleanup was just the way I like it. I picked up a shell, thinking it was styrofaom only to discover my happy mistake and throw it back onto the sand. A great beach cleanup would be finding nothing. A good one is mistaking a shell for trash and then carrying on my way, walking more than bending. 

Day 249 - Jan. 31, 2012

lifeguard station 26 - Ocean Park, Santa Monica CA

trash collected for 20 min.

1.3 pounds

934.5 pounds total

I'm including the petition to ban cigarette smoking in Wrightsville Beach, N.C. again here. The thing is this, my friend Danielle who has the fantastic blog It Starts With Me where she does 20 min. cleanups in N.C., has collected 38,585 CIGARETTE BUTTS from her local beach.

OK smokers, I used to smoke too. I might still smoke were it not so terrible for your health. However, this is not anti-smokers, just anti-toxic-liter harming the marine environment where fish eat them, children play, and the list goes on....

SO please, even if you smoke, add your name to the petition to get smoking banned in a community where one person, with her family and friends, have collected over 38,000 cigarette butts, 20 minutes at a time. I think I feel sick. And Danielle, you absolutely rock!

Good news! The Big Island of Hawaii (my favorite place in the world -- a sweeping statement that I totally mean) has banned SINGLE USE PLASTIC BAGS! 

Here's MSNBC's coverage of how the mayor of Kona signed the bill into effect. 

Go Hawaii! Kauai and Maui enacted similar laws last year. 

Used plastic bottles as skylights? It works, and watch how.

A talented photographer linked to The Daily Ocean. I'd like to return the favor. It thrills me to hear from fellow photographers, ocean lovers, anyone who feels moved by a post they come across on The Daily Ocean. Comments welcome. 

Please check out Tom Cunningham's astoundingly beautiful and helpful photography blog -

PLAYING WITH THE CAMERA

Day 248 - Jan. 30, 2012

lifeguard tower 26 - Ocean Park, Santa Monica CA

trash collected for 20 min.

1.6 pounds

933.2 pounds total 

My friend Danielle started her own Daily Ocean beach cleanup project after coming out with me in Santa Monica over a year and a half ago. She is doing incredible things! Her focus (although she picks up all trash along her 20 min. cleanup) is cigarette butts. She's collected a whopping 38,585 cigarette butts around her local beaches in Wrightsville N.C.!

Think they need to ban smoking from beaches? 

Good gravy that's a lot of ciggie butts!

Banning smoking on Wrightsville Beaches is coming up for a vote, and you can sign a petition encouraging the Board of Aldermen to do so. 

Please vote to ban cigarette smoking on the beach and then pass on this link through all your channels - email, twitter, FB, you name it. 

Let's get those signatures in! Join Danielle and Surfrider by taking a step in the direction of healthier oceans everywhere, and then pass it on! Thank you. 

In Surfrider's e-newsletter, "SOUP" they highlighted a New York Times article on BP's internal emails revealing they knew full well just how much oil was spilling into the Gulf from the beginning, and they kept it under wraps. I'm not surprised, but I still feel sick to my stomach. 

Here's the link. 

"Soup" (Surfrider) also provided a link to garbage trashing the shores of the Mexican Caribbean. I have seen this first hand having done at least one Daily Ocean cleanup in Tulum, Mexico. 

Seeing the LA Times photographer cover the problem in Mexico, which points to the much larger problem in the ocean, was encouraging. The article goes into more depth on the currents carrying the waste that then spit it up all over "paradise." 

Thank you LA Times for the relevant piece, and for focusing people's attention on ocean health, and the disposable plastics crisis our blue planet faces. 

Day 247 - Jan. 27, 2012

lifeguard tower 26 - Ocean Park, Santa Monica CA

trash collected for 20 min. 

3 pounds

931.6 pounds

Community Count Day 190 - Mark Armen

trash collected for 20 min. 

3 pounds

911.5 pounds total

The Daily Ocean combined total - 1,843.1 pounds of trash off beaches worldwide 

Thanks to my friend Mark, my first night back since being home from Kenya was a total blast. It had been way too long since we'd been out on the beach together. I spent so much of my time chatting away that I forgot to take more pictures!

Mark is up to some seriously awesome, concrete, environmental solutions. He's one to watch. Here is just one of his creative projects. It's an inventive and catchy way to keep cigarette butts from entering out oceans, waterways and littering our streets - THE BAIT TANK. Check it out!

Being home feels great. I'm looking ahead to my last year of beach cleanups, and more than likely less than that. 

I started this blog in March 2009 (I don't do a beach cleanup everyday - my average is every three and my goal is 365 non-consecutive days), but this year I was away for more than one third of the entire year! That's right. Over four months of time spent out of town and far away! 

This makes carrying the momentum of The Daily Ocean a challenge, leaves me feeling behind, and creates the opportunity to ease up on myself with the proper reflection. I've changed since I formed my goals for this project, but I love getting out onto the beach, picking up the liter, taking the photographs and then sharing it with you. 

Bring on 2012!

The last shot of the night. Inspirational. The view, that is, not the photograph, so I thought it fitting to leave you with the news that - 


ALBERTSONS GROCERY STORE IS IN THE PROCESS OF VOLUNTARILY REMOVING PLASTIC BAGS FROM THEIR STORES! GO ALBERTSONS!


For those of you outside of CA, this is huge news and could be compared to whatever your home state, or countries largest chain super-grocery store is deciding to do the same. There's the WOO-HOO I was looking for. Here's the scoop if you'd like to read more. 

Out of the country from DEC. 31 - JAN. 18, 2012

Garen and I are traveling with my dad and his wife Gretchen to Kenya. We leave the 31st and will be home at the end of January. Our friend Brigid will be hear to look after our cat, and I'll be back on the beach to resume my 20 min. cleanups after the 18th. 


Have a happy, healthy New Year's Eve! 


119 beach cleanups to go in 2012 to meet my 365 non-consecutive day goal. 


Here's to a fun, healthy and productive new year full of possibility and new adventures.

Day 246 - Dec. 27, 2011

lifeguard tower 26 - Ocean Park, Santa Monica CA

trash collected for 20 min.

2.1 pounds

928.6 pounds total

While uploading my photographs from today, it struck me that every item in this post is a byproduct of human convenience. I know, I've thought this many times, perhaps at least 246 times, but for some reason today, it hit me as particularly silly that the items trashing our beaches, hurting and in some cases killing our marine life, are all made to be used for minutes, or even seconds before rendered useless, and discarded. 

Here's to a successful ban on single use plastic bags in Los Angeles in 2012.

Fingers, and shards of styrafoam littered the high tide line. Impossible to retrieve all of the fragments, I stooped over anyway to collect the bits that I could. Frustrating. 

I'm sure this quote is widely reprinted, but I just read it Christmas Day. 


"From birth, man carries the weight of gravity on his shoulders. He is bolted to earth. But man has only to sink beneath the surface and he is free." - Jacques-Yves Cousteau

Day 245 - Dec. 26, 2011

lifeguard tower 26 - Ocean Park, Santa Monica CA 

trash collected for 20 min. 

5.1 pounds

926.5 pounds total

 Christmas festivities swept me up. This cleanup feels like ages ago instead of four days. Christmas Eve and Day stand alone from the rest of the year as a time for slowing down, and feeding all the senses. Coming out the other side, it's hard to get the gears turning again. Winter is a time for turning in, reflecting on the year that's passed, and looking ahead to the new one with wonderment. 

With 120 cleanups to go, a few trips taking me out of town for days at a time, and my average of one beach cleanup every three days, 2012 will be the final year for The Daily Ocean. This time next year, I'll be counting down to my final few cleanups, if I haven't already finished. 

What's next? I ask myself how will I combine this blog, my love of writing and photography into a new phase? 

This man combines his skills as a photographer, sculptor, set designer and diver to create underwater site specific installations. Let's get him to sink some of his figures into the Santa Monica Bay. All of his concrete, life-size people are frozen doing contemporary acts, oblivious to the environmental effects they create. Stunning. 

underwatersculpture.com 

Day 244 - Dec. 21, 2011

lifeguard tower 26 - Ocean Park, Santa Monica CA

trash collected for 20 minutes

1 pound

921.4 pounds total

After over 200 sunset cleanups featuring many varieties of plastic bits and bobs, I'm lost for new words to describe them. What's left to say? The tone of this question I ask myself is one of genuine inquiry, not defeat. But that's my job, figuring out how to convey the feeling that finding these items again and again inspires within me. I guess the truth is, sometimes there aren't any new words to share with you.

I have a question. How is your company addressing its packaging littering the streets, oceans, and everywhere in between? What's that? You've never heard of 

EXTENDED PRODUCER RESPONSIBILITY?

Pink straws remind me of Baskin and Robbins. Anyone? Orange Frappes and grilled Hot Dogs = childhood memories with my Dad.

The beach was pretty clean last night though, which makes for one smiling cleanup. 

Day 243 - Dec. 20, 2011

lifeguard tower 26 - Ocean Park, Santa Monica CA

trash collected for 20 min.

2.2 pounds

920.4 pounds total

Marina Debris's Holiday Gift Catalog is out! Before you do that last minute shopping, check this out!

For gifts that last, there's no better source of inspiration. And yes, you do detect a tinge of irony. Hats off to Marina though! She's an incredibly thoughtful artist with a message.

Seattle is the newest city to implement a ban on single use plastic bags. Hurray!

Migrating Grebes, like the ones we have here in the winter, mistook a Walmart Parking Lot in Utah for water. 1500 died after their crash landing, but over 3000 were released to the water. Grebe's can't take off on land. They need water to propel them airborne. I'm a fan of these elegant water birds. 

Check out this article explaining the incident.

Sunset on December 20, 2011 in Santa Monica CA. Not bad for the day before winter. 

Day 242 - Dec. 19., 2011

lifeguard tower 26 - Ocean Park, Santa Monica CA

trash collected for 20 minutes

4.4 pounds

918.2 pounds total

I'm over the worst of a nasty cold that kept me indoors for almost a week and a half. After being away from the beach for so long, I didn't care about the drizzle as I pulled into the beach parking lot last night. Looking forward to toes in the sand, I pulled up my hood, and headed out for my 20 minute routine beach cleanup.

"Litter Soup?" Mandy Barker's photographs depict just that with all objects taken from beaches and oceans around the world. Extraordinary. 

The sun is already makings its way behind the Pacific as I write this post. 

I'm looking forward to tonight's cleanup. 

Do you love the ocean? I came upon this heart in the sand at the end of my cleanup. It reminded me of a marine biologist I admire. Join Wallace J Nichols's 100 BLUE ANGELS. One man living his dream to work for the ocean, channeling social media and crowd sourcing for the highest good. We want this guy working for the big blue, and you can help! Here's how.

Getting in the chilly bay that morning felt worth the ice cream headache the waves produced. A couple of sea lions were a little too curious for my taste. Being the only body surfer in the water meant that at one point I hung off the back of my friend Bailey's board when one came for a closer inspection.