Guest Speakers

The harvest, on a cold Sunday morning

Originally uploaded by ghb624

While rifling flickr for nasty plastic photos, (see my plastic visual world map for details), I come across people documenting and commenting on the ever increasing amounts of plastic pollution. Blogged from there is this weeks  Guest Speaker

It’s been a while since I’ve done a rant about littering. Seems like that’s reason enough to revisit the subject. If only because I feel better after venting …
When you walk and pick up litter on a daily basis, you start to see patterns or cycles in this miserable business. Sunday morning seems to always result in the largest amount of stuff to be dealt with. Presume that’s because of all those so&so’s who have something like Saturday Night Fever and as a side-effect are prone to leave a trail of trash wherever they go. Perhaps it’s bar hopping, perhaps just cruising here and there to avoid going home, who knows.
Whatever. Anyway, above is a typical assortment of what we come across while walking through our neighborhood and immediate surrounding areas for about an hour, covering a couple miles or so in the process. We do tend to walk a bit farther on Sunday mornings, but that’s not enough to explain the larger quantity of litter. After MUCH observation, the Saturday night after-effect thing is unmistakeable.

Afterthought: When I was first getting religion about this business of fighting litter, the main motivator was wanting to keep the neighborhood from looking trashy. Yes, it was pretty much a bourgeois thing — promoting respectability, responsible behavior and all that. Lately, another and more significant motivator has entered the picture. Specifically, seeing what eventually happens to all this plastic trash. A lot of it ends up going into the waterways, where it may very well snag in the underbrush and be part of the growing visual pollution problem one sees in previously “natural” areas. But a lot of it also keeps on going until it reaches the oceans and moves on the vast ocean currents. One horrendous result is the vast pool of plastic debris which has built up in the north central part of the Pacific. If you haven’t seen news reports on this subject, here’s one primer:
www.ecocycle.org/askeco-cycle/2005/1028.cfm

Uploaded by ghb624 on 20 Jan 08, 11.56AM PST.

facebook

well I’ve gone an done it – joined face book and I have started a page called Leave Only Footprints. Like the blog doncha see? Still grappling with all the intricacies… but if you want to be a fan please feel free to adore me.

However less about me. I joined so I could be as one with these plastic refuseniks

Want to cut down on your plastic rubbish? – you can find plastic free products with the >>>A-Z<<< plastic free index

giving up on plastic in Lancaster

If you happen to live in Lancaster and you want to give plastic then you are lucky lucky lucky.

This secular University based  no to plastic group are giving up plastic for lent

They have organised a load of workshops, a lively google discussion group and have a face book presence.

Every day you get a new plastic free tip like this one

Go on check them out – they are doing all the work for you.

Even if you don’t live in Lancaster its extremely relevant.

The fab picture Plastic bag on tropical beach is by  Bag Monster -  check him out - he too  is fun.

Want to cut down on your plastic rubbish? – you can find other plastic free products with the >>>A-Z<<< plastic free index

Disposing of polystyrene

As with all plastic polystyrene does not biodegrade. Instead it hangs around for years creating everlasting litter and problomatic pollution.

the boffs are working on the problem and here are their solutions

Recycling

Polystyrene is difficult to recycle. Difficult but not impossible …

For those of you who insist on using plastic cups there is  the  save a cup recycling system

For the other stuff there is a  process for recycling  polystyrene that uses  the styromelt system.

The Rest

Polystyrene that ends up as litter has to be picked up – by the council – you pay the cost or by decent folk who care about the environmnet.

The photo is  Snowballs that never melt  Originally uploaded by Ted Raynor

To see some really nasty beach pollution click on the image for pictures of his  beach clean up

Them surf boys keep the plastic pressure up with their rise above plastics website

Belgium Links

news of a Belgium plastic is rubbish  blogger has come to my attention thanks to his jolly kind shout out – sadly I cant read his blog because it is in well to be honest I am not quite sure what language but the pictures are easy enough to understand – have a look

For other plastic free blogs check out my web links

Anti Plastic Campaigns

There are many out there who find that plastic is becoming a problem and so have done something about it. Anti plastic  campaigns range from  specific issues such as banning plastic bags to the more general anti litter protests. Those I have come accross are listed here. Feel free to add.

Take the Pledge

Sign up to one of these anti plastic activities

Leonardo Di Capreo – yes the filmstar-  is campaigning against plastic- you can sign his pledge here 

Rise Above Plastics Petition -The surf rider foundation have had enough of bobbing about in a sea of bottles – see their Petition

Raising Awareness

The Junk Raft – these guys are sailing round the world on a boat made of rubbish to raise awareness of plastic in the sea

Ban The Plastic Baggers

This UK site is committed to seeing the back of the nastly plastic bag – take a look – they are really great

The all American bag monster is daft but really gets the meesage accross.

General waste Haters

Hate waste got to hate plastic

Bottled Water -a ridiculous waste of plastic and resources

Waste Reducers -all over the world people are reducing their waste to zero – yes thats zero. Check them out they are amazing 

Dirty Beaches, Plastic Sea and Choking Rivers

Beach cleanups – once again the unsung heros will be out there cleaning up the beaches. Why not join them this year – click here for a list – if you know of any others please do add to it.

Fighting marine pollution …follow the link

Another great initiative

The beautiful and remote beaches of Northern Cypress are relatively unknown to tourists and so are havens for wildlife of all sorts. Every summer sees a protected species of turtles arrive to lay their eggs, and the small Klidhes isles, are home to the last colony of European, Audouin seagulls.Sadly as with beaches worldwide they becoming increasingly polluted. The problem is once again, seaborne plastic rubbish being washed up onto the shoreline. Plastic of course does not rot away so once there that rubbish will be there for decades. This stunning landscape is suffering badly.

And its not just the landscape that suffers, plastic is rubbish is a killer. Turtles choke to death on plastic bags they mistake for jellyfish. Seabirds feed small pellets of plastic to their chicks. Seabirds cant live off plastic so, even though the chicks stomachs are full, they starve to death.

Thats why Lord Maginnis of Drumglass is anxious to help, to do something about it. He has visited Northern Cypress regularly for a number of years and knows it well. He supports the idea of liaison between the authorities and local groups to organise a beach clean up. They know the army would be willing to help transport and dispose of the rubbish, working alongside school children, university students and local volunteers for a coastline long, rubbish busting week of action.

He says, “Turkish Cypriots would be keen to embark on a clean-up but they will need support – litter pickers, bags, promotional tee-shirts, and sponsors. If anyone wants to help, they can contact me at maginnisk@parliament.uk.

Sadly, the Turkish Cypriots are unlikely to get any support from the UK Foreign Office or our High Commission in Cyprus – they have studiously ignored the Human rights of the people in the TRNC for 34 years – it makes me so ashamed”.

Win things

Here’s a bit more on the extremely well organised and admirable people over at My Zero Waste . Not content with giving up waste creation themselves they have organised a competition with lovely prizes to encourage the rest of us to cut our waste too. There are a series of pledges – you can sign as many or as few as you want. the more you sign the better your chances of winning.

ALSO THIS

 on potty girls blog  

Join me and break the bottled water habit! Getting rid of bottled water is a win-win! You save money and water and help lessen the amount of plastic in landfills! You can now even win a trip to Glacier National Park.
click here to learn more about the campaign 

 

Give up plastic bags and win a clean world

California needs you – go to spouting off to find out why ….

The plastics industry’s pressure and the chaos that passes for the California legislature is making passage of AB 2058 an uphill battle. The deadline to get the bag bill out of the Appropriations Committee has come and gone, but there is still a chance to resuscitate the bill from the dreaded state of suspended animation called “suspense”.

Pull out all the sports clichés. We are in the home stretch in the bottom of the ninth and we just passed the two-minute warning. To pull this off, everyone needs to pitch in.