Whitby Civic Society Beach Clean and Surveys News

Two members of the Whitby Civic Society joined twelve school children and their teachers from Rotherham on 19th February to collect refuse and survey 100m of the beach at Tate Hill Sands.
A total of 38 Kg of rubbish was collected which was a record for this stretch of beach in recent years, partly due to the children scrambling up on the rocks and so reaching rubbish normally unreached by older and less agile collectors!

Amongst the items collected were a much-tangled fishing net, several gloves, a mop, one shoe, several bottles (some broken), a very large number of broken pieces of polystyrene fast-food containers, a lot of fishing line and rope and a very heavy piece of metal possibly from a fishing boat.

We all enjoyed the experience and Whitby can be very grateful to the group for their help with keeping one of our beaches a little bit cleaner, dog-walkers should be less worried about their pets hurting their feet on broken glass and sea birds and visiting seals will be less likely to be trapped by fishing line and rope.

It is very good news that Hadleys Fish Restaurant in Bridge Street is going to change to using biodegradable food containers and we hope that other restaurants in Whitby will follow their example. We would also like to appeal to all residents, fishermen and visitors alike to be very careful with the disposal of their rubbish.

18th September Beachwatch went off well on a bright sunny day. The attached picture was taken by a Jan Mackness who joined the Tate Hill team while Dennis and I had three volunteers from Sleights to help us at Upgang. We found rather less rubbish than usual as the survey was at Spring Tide and the beach had been partially cleaned off by the sea!

The names of the Tate Hill team they were: Elizabeth Cheyne (with Hetty), George Dawson, Geoff (and Kyle) Wilson. The picture was taken by Jan Mackaness.

Details about the surveys and the work of the Marine Conservation Society can be obtained from Doreen Wort (01947 603793).