Please join us Saturday January 19th for the first scheduled 2013
Long Beach cleanup.
We will be meeting at posted cordinates at 9:30am for cito sign in before heading out onto the beach at 9:45




 

Some supplies will be available however please feel free to bring your own, Rubber gloves, pick-up sticks and trash bags are always handy.
January can be a wet and windy time so please dress for anything. Boots, raincoat and headgear are a good place to start.

The Long Beach Peninsula, on Washington’s southernmost coast, boasts 28 miles of sandy Pacific Ocean beach. Like beaches everywhere, it sees a tremendous amount of humanity’s garbage being tossed or washed ashore.

In 2001, a group of local residents and concerned visitors began an all-volunteer effort to tackle the garbage along these beaches.

The original group called itself the GrassRoots Garbage Gang because that’s what it was, a very grassroots group of folks who were distressed by the trash on the beaches. Since that time, the effort has mushroomed, with volunteers coming from all over the state to help out at one or all three of the annual cleanups


2013 cleanups:  Jan 19 – April 20 - July 5th

Each event begins around 9:30 AM on a Saturday and finishes up between 11:30 and noon. All volunteers are then treated to hot clam chowder. (We’ll have other soups, too, if clam chowder isn’t your Soup of Choice!) Check with the organizers for the location of this delicious, local specialty lunch. Soup is usually served between 11:30 AM and 1:30 PM.

On the Friday evening preceding each cleanup, there will be an evening event which you are invited to attend.  This may include a speaker or other interesting programming, so be sure to check this website as we get closer to the cleanup time. www.ourbeach.org

WHERE

The Peninsula boasts seven major Beach Approach Roads. Beach Approach Coordinators will be at each one of these to greet you. These approaches are: Seaview, Sid Snyder Drive, Bolstad, Cranberry, Klipsan, Bay Avenue and Oysterville Road.

• Come prepared. Be sure to wear sturdy shoes which do NOT have open toes. Protective gloves are a must – and heavy work gloves are best! Rain gear and a hat are helpful for both inclement weather and to keep from getting a sunburn in good weather.
• Remember:  Never turn your back on the ocean!!!
• The Beach Approach Coordinator will give you bags and “picker-uppers” and show you where we need your help most and where to put the trash you collect.
• Look for garbage closer to the middle of the sandy area. (Garbage is not normally lying around at the edge of the ocean on the sand, except during the 4^th of July holiday.)
• Collect the following litter:

1. All plastics
2. All glass
3. All metals
4. All waxed cardboard
5. All ‘spent’ fireworks parts
6. Wood pieces which contain nails or other sharp objects
7. All twine, rope and fishnet

• Leave the following items on the beach:

1. ‘Clean’ wood (without nails or sharp objects).  This will soon become firewood on the beach for the enjoyment of beachgoers.
2. Dead birds: These are monitored by COASST (Coastal Operations and Seabird Survey Crew) volunteers.
3. Dead animals.

• When you’re done, leave your filled bags at the high tide mark for our trucks to haul in.  You may run across items which are too large or too heavy to move.  Please tell the Approach Coordinator about the item and its location so we can work to have it removed.
• Please return any unused supplies to the Beach Approach Coordinator.
• Be sure to join us for a hot meal – Chili, Clam Chowder, Veg. Split Pea or the Soup of the Day!

• It takes up to 750 volunteers to do each cleanup of the Long Beach Peninsula’s 28-mile stretch of ocean beaches.
• 60-80% of all marine debris comes from land-based sources, such as the trash caught in storm drains or blown away from beaches and streets where people fail to pick it up.
• Fishermen (recreational and commercial) lose things (such as fishing line and rope) at sea or toss debris overboard where it is either eaten by marine and bird life or is carried by ocean movement to land.
• Balloons look lovely as they float in the sky, but they become little bits of plastic when they deflate and are often eaten by birds which mistake them for food.
• Plastics are the most notorious for marine wildlife destruction. For example, the large, heavy- mil plastic bags dumped at sea can cover a 4- foot- square area of sand, which stops the food supply from reaching the razor clams in the sand below the bag!
• Every piece of plastic ever created still exhists!
• Cigarette butts live on for about one year before they disintegrate, while some cigarette filters take a much longer time before they are no longer visible as small, light-colored items in the sand.
•  Bottle caps never do disintegrate and can be found littering streets, washing into storm drains, thrown about on beaches. While their colors may fade, they remain brightly colored for many years.
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  • Fireworks create a tremendous amount of plastic bits, especially during the Fourth of July holiday.
  • 2011 Japanese tsunami debris is on its way and some pieces have already reached Washington beaches.