Talking trash about the Jersey Shore
The embarrassment of dirty underpants, left behind at the beach or tossed in the ocean, could turn tragic for a sea turtle that mistakes them for a jellyfish and chokes to death.
The embarrassment of dirty underpants, left behind at the beach or tossed in the ocean, could turn tragic for a sea turtle that mistakes them for a jellyfish and chokes to death.
But soiled underwear, one of the many bizarre pieces of debris found on New Jersey beaches last year, accounted for just a few ounces of the 59,270 pounds of trash collected during a large clean-up on the state's sandy shores, a report released yesterday said.
"This is just in New Jersey and just two days worth of cleaning," said Tavia Danch of Clean Ocean Action in New Jersey. "This is just six hours of cleaning the beaches."
In those short six hours in the spring and fall, more than 5,000 volunteers with Clean Ocean Action's annual Beach Sweeps picked up more than 302,000 items in 132 locations along the coast.
Plastic lids and bottle caps were the top offender, with more than 33,000 pieces littering the beaches. Cigarette butts were a close second, with a little over 30,000 on the beaches. Volunteers also found costume vampire teeth and an iPhone.
Plastic accounted for nearly 80 percent of the trash, Danch said, and nature has a hard time breaking it down. Newspapers disappear after six weeks in the ocean, while cigarette butts can take up to five years to disintegrate. A plastic bottle, however, can remain intact for 450 years on the high seas.
"We really want people to [understand] that what's washing up on our beaches has everything to do with their daily lives," Danch said. "There are things we could easily avoid, namely by not purchasing single-use products."
Single-use products include plastic bottles, shopping bags, and utensils, Danch said, and there are ever-increasing alternatives to them in the marketplace.
In Ocean City, Mayor Sal Perillo said businesses are being encouraged to forgo plastic bags or offer alternatives.
"The beach is without a doubt the lifeblood of our economy," he said. "We have over three million tourists a year and the beach is a main reason why they come."
Nevertheless, the number of plastic shopping bags found on New Jersey beaches has increased steadily since the early 1990s, Clean Ocean Action said. Although cigarette smoking has decreased, the number of butts found on beaches has remained at the top of the list, mostly due to indoor smoking bans in New York and New Jersey.
Discarded cigarette butts, plastic bottles and bags turning up in the ocean and on the beaches doesn't always mean someone was careless after a day on the sand, though. Danch says trash is often washed into storm drains after heavy rains, slowly making its way down inland streams and rivers until it's dumped into the sea, endangering the marine life that might mistake a cigarette filter for food or get wrapped up in plastic bags.
"It starts at home," she said.
Odd but typical pieces of debris found included syringes, tires, tampons, and shotgun shells by the hundreds. The truly bizarre included an air conditioner, mannequin legs, a guitar, boomerang, baby crib and a Christmas tree, with lights.
Clean Ocean Action, now celebrating its 25th year in New Jersey, will hold the first of its two 2010 Beach Sweeps on April 24.
For more information, visit www.cleanoceanaction.org.
