Love your Coast North Shore Clean-up nets huge haul

Thu, 26 Apr 2012 12:12:42 +1200

Volunteers teamed-up to remove over 80,000 pieces of rubbish from the beaches of Auckland’s North Shore just one year after cleaning-up the same stretch of coast.

790 passionate volunteers and school students pitched in to pick-up litter from this iconic urban coastline in their ‘Love your Coast’ North Shore Clean-up over two weeks in late March and early April.

In all nearly 3 tonnes and 23,050 litres of rubbish – equivalent to around 100 full kerbside recycling bins -- was removed from beaches from Greenhithe in the inner harbour through to Whangaparaoa.

With help from offenders through the Department of Corrections our team has spent the last couple of weeks sorting through all of the rubbish collected and compiling detailed results on what was found.

The findings are troubling.

Just one year after the same beaches were cleaned, nearly twice the pieces of litter were removed. This rapid build-up of rubbish indicates that our littering behaviour is worsening and highlights an urgent need for education and action to stop this flow at the source.

During the event we delivered educational presentations to over 3,000 students from 16 schools around the region. Students from Vauxhall School, Rosmini College, Torbay School and Mairangi Bay School were so inspired by the message that they headed straight out to clean up their local stretch of coastline afterwards.

Support for the event was strong from the business community too with local printers Benefitz once again getting behind the cause and groups from Lantern Insurance, Travel Corporation, James and Wells Intellectual Property, Sitka Surfboards, Auckland Council, APRA, AMCOS, Andrew Stewart Ltd, ANZ, Hilton Hotel, ASB Takapuna, Herald on Sunday and many others all rolling-up their sleeves to get involved in clean-ups. A special thanks to the Torbay Sailing Club for getting stuck-in with clean-ups and for kindly hosting us for a post-event BBQ.

Event Director Ryley Webster was very pleased with the turnout. “It is encouraging to see so many passionate people turning up to help out, a sign that kiwis really are keen to look after their coastlines,” he says. “A huge thank you to everyone who got involved.”

Full results can be downloaded and viewed here and a slideshow of event photos can be seen on the official event page here.

Grisly discovery: Seabird found with guts full of rubbish

Mon, 12 Mar 2012 09:54:22 +1300

Children taking part in a beach clean-up as part of our Great Coromandel Coastal Clean-up made a grisly discovery in Colville Harbour last week. Among the rope, food wrappers and beverage bottles collected from the beach, a decomposing carcass of a seabird was found with chunks of plastic where its stomach once was.

The bird – an Oystercatcher – was discovered by students from Colville School just minutes after they had learned about this problem during an educational presentation from Brand Manager, Camden Howitt. Oystercatchers normally feed on mussels, oysters, limpets, crabs and small fish, but this one had eaten several small shards of plastic, mistaking them for food. “The children were shocked to see the issue so starkly illustrated in their own backyard,” said Howitt.

This was not the first time Howitt has seen rubbish affecting wildlife and he is not expecting it to be the last.

“We have witnessed colonies of Black Backed Gulls nesting amongst piles of rubbish on Auckland’s Rangitoto Island and seen Pied Shags wrapped in plastic in the Bay of Plenty,” says Howitt. “We even found a Little Blue Penguin strangled by a plastic bottle ring on Aotea/Great Barrier Island and horribly, turtles have washed up dead in the Hauraki Gulf with plastic in their guts.”

Around the world, plastic rubbish enters and pollutes our oceans at an alarming rate. Once there, it has devastating effects on the marine life it comes into contact with. An estimated 1,000,000 seabirds and 100,000 marine mammals are killed every year because they eat, or get trapped in rubbish.

Plastic pollution in our seas is primarily caused by individual littering. Around the world, 80% of marine debris comes from land-based sources and over half of that is single-use, disposable items. We can all look after our coastlines by disposing of our litter carefully, whether we are at the beach or on the street. Choosing to buy less disposable, single-use plastic products helps too and if you want to go a step further join one of our upcoming events today.

Great Coromandel Coastal Clean-up postponed to Saturday 10 March

Fri, 2 Mar 2012 14:03:12 +1300

Due to a decidedly shocking weather forecast for Saturday 3 March, we’ve made the call to postpone our Great Coromandel Coastal Clean-up by one week, to Saturday 10 March. Aside from the date change, all event plans remain the same.
A major part of our operations for the weekend, particularly around Coromandel Town, are based on boats and with heavy rain and winds forecast to hit 40 knots, it is simply not going to happen.
If you have registered to volunteer but can no longer take part due to the date change, email camden@sustainablecoastlines.org to let us know (it helps us with planning). If you have already booked your camp spot at Tucks Bay don’t worry, your booking is transferable to next weekend. If you can’t make it next weekend and would like a refund, email camden@sustainablecoastlines.org
With some fantastic weather (hopefully) on its way, we’re looking forward to an even bigger and better Great Coromandel Coastal Clean-up on Saturday 10 March.
We will be in touch with all registered volunteers early next week to provide final event details including what to bring, where to be and what’s planned. If you haven’t yet signed-up to volunteer, click here to register now so that you can stay in the loop with further event announcements.
Check out our event page for more information.

Launch of the Sustainable Coastlines Education Station

Tue, 31 Jan 2012 13:48:49 +1300

Meet the new edition to our team, the Sustainable Coastlines Education Station, which debuted at the Auckland Seafood Festival on Auckland Anniversary Weekend. With the generous support of Container Sales and Leasing, we have created a portable educational hub in an epic black shipping container, and it’s coming to talk trash at a town near you.
We’ve already had plenty of enquiries for its use and we’re looking for support to move it around the country to work with school students, PD workers and community groups. If you want to support our educational work and have your organisation promoted on this unique platform just email sam@sustainablecoastlines.org
Watch out for the Sustainable Coastlines Education Station over the coming months at our events and at educational workshops on Auckland’s Waterfront. It also be available for inclusion at events as a portable, ready made stage with an educational message, so if you want us to pay you a visit, just contact us.