Wardie Bay will be receiving its third deep clean of 2017 on Saturday 13 May from 11am – 1.30pm, as part of Beachwatch, the Marine Conservation Society’s (MCS) national beach clean and data collection campaign to highlight the issue of plastic waste at sea and on land.
Our first two Beachwatch events have been a great success, encouraging people from all across the community to take part. Wardie’s next event looks likely to attract more people than ever, including partners of the Have You Got The Bottle? campaign, calling for a deposit return scheme to be implemented in Scotland, and our local MSP, Ben Macpherson.
Since our last event, Wardie Bay Beachwatch has:
- taken part in an episode of Channel 4’s ‘Food Unwrapped’, with Catherine Gemmell of the Marine Conservation Society speaking on the issue of food packaging and ocean plastics.
- welcomed Dr Mark Hartl, of the Marine Environment MSc programme at Heriot Watt University, to take Wardie Bay’s first sediment samples for microplastics analysis.
- been invited to partner with the Have You Got The Bottle? campaign. (www.haveyougotthebottle.org.uk)
- been invited to have a stall to highlight the issues affecting the marine environment and MCS’s work, at the Royal Forth Yacht Club (RFYC) ‘Push the Boat Out’ open day at Granton Harbour on May 14th.
- joined forces with the Friends of Granton Castle Walled Garden to help spread the word about sister Beachwatch events at Royston beach, adjacent to the garden project.
- been offered our own dedicated wheelybin of beach cleaning kit by Edinburgh City Council.
- met with the crew of the Greenpeace Beluga II expedition which seeks to further highlight the issues affecting the shoreline and coastal waters of Scotland. Greenpeace are working with the MCS to record survey data from some of the most remote beaches in Scotland.
MCS surveys have recorded a rising tide of marine and beach litter since 1994. The four main sources of waste found on UK beaches come from items dropped or left by the public, fishing litter, sewage-related debris (SRD) and shipping. The effects are devastating to us, to our wildlife and to our economy. Marine litter can directly harm wildlife through entanglement and ingestion. Over 170 species of marine wildlife including seabirds, turtles and whales have been recorded mistaking marine litter for food resulting in starvation, poisoning and fatal stomach blockages. This in turn affects the fishing industry, our health and our economy as a whole.
The last Wardie Bay Beachwatch on April 1st found 38.35kg of plastic, rubber, metal, glass and sewage waste in twelve bags of rubbish from within a 100m stretch of survey area along the tideline. Our 24 local volunteers found everything from a pair of dentures to nearly 1,000 cotton bud sticks in just two hours. We are also finding Mermaid’s purses which is an indicator of sharks breeding in the area which makes our beach all the more special.
MCS Beachwatch results are vital in turning the tide on litter. They have helped influence changes to laws on the disposing of waste at sea, and resulted in investment in better sewage treatment at the coast. Local beach cleans like this one at Wardie Bay all help towards highlighting this serious issue.
“It would be wonderful to encourage the whole community to get involved. We are helping to join the dots along our beautiful coastline, to clean it up for our wildlife but also to bring the neighbourhood together to clean up our act as well as our beach. We all need to ask for better waste management and recycling in our neighbourhoods, and we can all help to make our environment a better place. By acting locally we can help to create change on a national scale,” said Karen of the Wardie Bay volunteer group.
Anyone wanting to take part in the clean up at Wardie Bay can find out more by contacting Karen Bates, email: wardiebaybeachwatch@gmail.com or visit www.mcsuk.org. You can also find us on facebook @WardieBayBeachwatch and twitter @wardiebaybeach
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