Dirty secret: Students discover hidden beach rubbish

 

- JULIA WADE

One of Mangawhai’s beautiful pristine beaches came under inquisitive scrutiny recently from a dedicated group of children on a treasure-seeking mission of a different kind. 

Two classes of enthusiastic Year 4 Mangawhai Beach School [MBS] students assisted by teachers and parents, combed sands, inspected foliage and scoured over and under craggy rocks of the Heads Surf Beach, June 29, on a mission to track down even the smallest particles of rubbish.

Plastic-free Mangawhai representative, Stephanie Gibson also joined the search after first explaining the more camouflaged types of waste that could only be found under careful examination.   

“I talked about the fact there is little obvious rubbish on the beach partly because we have some amazing people in the community who pick up litter regularly,” she says. “However if the children looked closer, buried in the sand there are bits of micro-plastics which are bigger bits of plastic that have broken into smaller pieces, and ‘nurdles’ which are little beads of plastic used to make plastic items, that have fallen out of container ships.”
Gibson also discussed how easily rubbish can find its ways to the coastline via wind, rain and through drains, and the effects of plastic on wild life, describing how animals miss out on vital nutrition and can die with bellies full of litter, after mistaking plastic items for food. 

With the challenge of Plastic-free July now here, students came up with ideas and goals they and their families could try to reduce waste such as waste-free lunch boxes or substituting glad wrap for paper or reusable containers, reusable coffee cups instead of disposables and taking cloth bags to carry shopping. 

MBS teacher Tanya Hampton says that the students were surprised at the amount of waste collected on what appeared to be a clean-looking beach.  

“When we got back to school we spread out the rubbish so we could examine and discuss what sorts of rubbish we found - glass bottles, bottle caps, cigarette butts, clothing, coffee cups, tiny particles of plastic and even dog poo!” she says. “As a result of the Beach Clean-up, I think that the children were able to take more ownership of their own actions, and were able to better understand the importance of keeping our beaches and oceans free of rubbish.”

Photos:
1-6: no captions
7: [credit Tanya Hampton] no caption
8: A ‘nurdle’; a little bead of plastic used to make plastic items and easily missed due to its size and resemblance of sand.