Will Conner’s journal – Rubbish
Posted by TransparantSea on the October 6th 2009, in All, Environment
Kristy, Will, Chris – and the results of just 20 minutes near Iluka
The reason this particular group of people are sharing the Transparentsea adventure is because we all enjoy similar creative pastimes such as, surfing, music, sailing, art, writing etc. Obviously our natural surroundings play a huge part in our ability to enjoy these pleasures.
It seems a lot of my good and bad habits came from what I learnt as a kid. I remember my parents being super addiment that I never litter, especially a beach. That’s the reason why I feel kind of guilty if I don’t take at least a few pieces of rubbish with me after every surf.
Our first sailing guest was Kristy Theissling (General Manager of Surfrider Foundation Australia) She took this concept one step further and really taught our whole crew about the actual affects of all of the rubbish we are collecting along the way. Kristy’s enthusiasm and energy at the end of each full day of sailing really got us off our arses. We all took notice real quick! Not only did she sail circles around us, she was ready to load up bags of rubbish, sort and log it all then teach us the graphic details of what all this rubbish does to our marine life.
For example: A small piece of Styrofoam breaks down and looks like fish eggs. This gets lodged in the stomach and slowly starves the poor creature who ingests it. A floating plastic bag looks like a jellyfish which turtles love and that’s another death trap. The list goes on and on, but finding a plastic bag on the beach now really hits home and I feel like I just saved a turtle.
Right now the sun is setting on a perfect afternoon, we’re at a small beach campsite on the north coast. Some kids just walked by me and threw empty beer bottles in the sand dunes …
Will Conner.
