coastal clean up crew

As part of the Ocean Conservancy‘s 2012 International Coastal Cleanup, Dee Serage of the Sanibel Captiva Conservation Foundation (SCCF) organized volunteers to pick up and document litter on our beaches and coastlines this past Saturday. So the beach on Sanibel from Blind Pass to Bowman’s is free and clear of any trash because of our fun little cleanup crew in the photo above from left to right… Susan (Soul Sister Susan), Daron who was our efficient record keeper, me, Super Sheller Clark, Judy, Grant, Cameron and Berringer.

We spread out and literally combed the beach.. or should I say “litteraly”.

beach combers clean up

We searched high on the beach for trash…

judy susan clean up

…and we searched low on the beach for litter. We had to leave these big shells piles for another day but couldn’t help but look for something unusual.

seashells boys

Berringer did find a few unusal shells. Oh, and remember the SPOTTED EAGLE RAY I showed on my last video? Clark had “spotted” the ray in the water and told everybody to come look at it but Berringer is the one who knew exactly what it was right away. “Look! It’s an EAGLE RAY!” (you see why I like him?)

berringer alternate tellin

He found a beautiful yellow ALTERNATE TELLIN pair…

alternate tellin yellow

And look at the bright purple color of this SOUTHERN HORSE MUSSEL !

False Tulip Mussel horsemussel

It even has purple in the interior…

interior false tulip mussel

Grant found this very cool completely dried PUFFER FISH

grant puffer fish

This is what I call cool BEACH BLING

dried puffer fish

Grant also found this sweet little SEA URCHIN…

tiny sea urchin

Yes, there were lots of shell piles like I showed you  in the cyber shelling photo on my last post with but we were on a mission to pick up trash and we had a very long walk so we only picked up the cool unusual things that didn’t weigh much… like this ROSEATE SPOONBILL FEATHER! We rarely find these…

roseate spoonbill feather sanibel

Clark brought home this aqua buoy. We couldn’t throw that away!

clark with aqua bouy

But back to the main reason we were there… to rid the beach of any trash. Cigarettes, plastic bottles, plastic caps, more and more plastic were the top items found but I was so surprised to see so many balloons with ribbons on the beach. Balloons are a huge NO-NO to bring to the beach! They can get swallowed or wrapped around wildlife so please never take balloons to the beach for any occasion.

ribbon balloon bowmans

Fortunately, our beaches aren’t terribly littered so I think we only filled up 7 fairly small bags which is not so bad for a 2 and 1/2 mile walk. But Clark didn’t stop there. He even saw trash thrown over the beach access boardwalk so he fished it out under the rail. Go Super Sheller Clark!

clark picking up trash

 I’m sure yall do this already, but just a reminder while we are shelling… let’s pick up any trash and put it in our shell bag until we can find a trash can or dumpster to dispose of it. Okay, So… lets recap what we do as “shellers”. On our beach walks we can get exercise, find treasure, explore, learn about wildlife and the creatures of the sea AND save the planet AND spread peace on earth. LOL Yes! Shellers save the planet! We are the Super Shellers!

Bowmans Beach trash