week 8--Ginger tells a story in pics

On Monday, June 25th I walked for my second week in a row without John.  (He was really under the weather)  However, I still did not find tracks!!!  I'm always sure I will when he does not walk with me because the one time I did not walk with him in 3 years, he found tracks!!!!  I have never found tracks! Oh well, I will keep trying.

I was greeted by a beautiful Wrightsville Beach sky.  I really do love our beach and that I am able to live so close.  People come here from all over the country to take in this view, and I could see it everyday if I wanted to.  How lucky is that?

I could not get enough of the sky.

But, what people do not come here to enjoy are cigarette butts in the sand.  It is not pleasant to walk in the sand, sit in the sand, or play in the sand amongst cigarette butts.  If I only focused on picking up cigarette butts, there is no telling how many I would collect, but no time for that when searching for sea turtle tracks (which is way more fun!)

Nicorette and cigarett butt side by side.  Butt was smoked, but Nicorette was still in the package.  Oh well, guess you can always quit tomorrow. 

I found this to be a rather interesting day for litter clean up.  The first thing I found was an egg, not a sea turtle egg, but an Easter egg.  I have found these on the beach before and I am sure kids are playing with them, but it is always a little perplexing to me.  Today I found 1 1/2 eggs and they were not even close together.  So, does that mean that two different families were playing with Easter eggs on the beach in June?

I also found an umbrella, not a beach umbrella, but a rain umbrella.  Although, it seems a little flimsy, it does work.  I have washed off the salt and will be carrying it to the sea turtle hospital so that people can use it for shade while they wait outside in the sun in long lines just so they can get a glimpse at the sea turtles inside.

There were fireworks on the beach this morning as well.  I hate finding fireworks because they contain plastic.  Not only are the casings made from plastic, but the explosives contain plastic as well.  Since they explode, there would be no way to clean all the litter from the fireworks, not that people seem to think they need to collect the fireworks anyway as we often find the casings left on the beach.  Did you know it was illegal to have fireworks on our beach and it also could disturb a nesting sea turtle or hatchlings?

I have said before that I always lose expensive sunglasses and I always find cheap sunglasses.  Such was the case today.  While I didn't lose any sunglasses, I did find two pair of cheap ones.

Not only do people need sunglasses for beautiful beach days, but they may also want to wear sunscreen and drink a cold beverage.

Farther down the beach, I came across a beautiful sand castle.  The only down side is that there was a huge hole behind it.  From the photo, it is difficult to tell just how deep the hole is, but if a sea turtle had fallen in the hole, it would be a struggle to climb out if she would be able to climb out at all.  I hope everyone will begin to fill in their holes prior to leaving the beach so that the beach will be safe for our sea turtles and for pedestrians who may not be paying attention to their footing.

I always find toys on the beach, but I don't really know how to classify a plastic fish with the word "Shakespeare" engraved in it.  I quickly googled Shakespearean quotes on "nature" and found this from The Tempest:


O wonder!
How many goodly creatures are there here!
How beauteous mankind is! O brave new world
That has such people in't!  
(not really about nature if it wasn't taken out of context, but it works okay here)

And then I came across some rose petals.  They were very beautiful and they caused me to wonder if there had truly been some kind of Shakespearean theme on the beach because we all know that "a rose by any other name would smell as sweet".

Sadly, I mainly find litter on the beach, not rose petals.  I found three balloons today, which we all know cause sickness in animals, such as sea turtles, who ingest them and injury for animals that become entangled in them.  Many times the sickness and injury from ingestion and entanglement of balloons lead to the untimely death of animals.  Releasing balloons is by all purposes litter and it is included in WB ordinances.  One balloon I found today was entangled and melted into Sargassum.  I have frozen this sample for Bonnie Monteleone who is currently researching litter and Sargassum.  (yes, not only do I have trash in my garage, but I now have trash in my freezer  too!)

I was reminded that we are like the "peaceful warrior" when we do good by others, the ocean and the earth.

The final items I picked up on the beach were 4 plastic bags.

I bid farewell to our beautiful beach for the day....

...and went to the parking lot where I used the plastic bags to collect the trash there.  I left the trash from the parking lot by the trash can and placed the recyclables in the appropriate containers that have been donated by Surfrider, so these items are not tallied on this blog.

From the beach, not the parking lot, I collected 4 bags of trash including the following items:


55 cigarette butts
4 plastic bags
4 articles of clothing including 2 tank tops and 2 socks
4 ziplock bags
9 toys
18 bottle caps
1 can
1 glass bottle
21 straws
6 plastic lids
1 flip flop shoe
1 rain umbrella
5 fireworks pieces
3 balloons
1 beach chair back---the canvas part only
2 pairs of sunglasses
1 pair of swimming goggles
3 plastic utensils
2 plastic cups
1 plastic Alamance County College Library card
1 red crayon


And at the end of the day, I wish I was as relaxed as Sasha Bear, our newest rescued cat.