Our Daily Ocean: Day 215

To accomplish great things, 

we must not only act, 

but also dream;

not only plan, but also believe.

~Anatole France

20 minutes at Access 20 on November 9, 2013

Litter by weight: .7 oz
Cigarette butts: 80

Total amount of cigarette butts removed from Wrightsville Beach, NC in 215 days:

56,677

Our Daily Ocean: Day 213

When I came across this piece of plastic at Wrightsville Beach, I thought it was just a stray piece of plastic.  Then I went to grab it and found that I couldn't pull it without it tearing.

So my kids and I started digging.  As we dug, we learned that we were digging out a "Food Lion" plastic bag that someone filled with sand and buried.  (Unfortunately, I don't have more photos because each time we thought we had removed enough sand to pull the bag the bag it would tear.  The last thing I wanted was for shreds of a plastic bag to blow away.)  Thankfully after digging around the bag enough we were able to get the whole thing!

Did you know that approximately 380 billion single-use plastic bags are used in the US every year?  That's more than 1,200 bags per US resident, per year.  Even if 99% were recycled, that'd still leave 3,800,000,000 plastic bags littered or in a landfill EVERY SINGLE YEAR.  But we're not even close to a 99% recycling rate with plastic bags.  The recycling rate for plastic bags is around 1 to 3%.

Not even close.

 There are some things that are easy to live without and plastic bags are definitely one of them...  do your part and refuse single-use plastic bags by bringing your own or going without.

P.S... If you're in Greensboro, NC, my friend Teresa aka Green Bag Lady will be handing out fabric bags Friday and Saturday!  More info here-- Green Bag Lady: Off to North Carolina

20 minutes on October 27, 2013 at Access 20

Litter by weight: 10.9 oz
Cigarette butts: 36

Total amount of cigarette butts removed from Wrightsville Beach, NC in 213 days: 

56,529

Our Daily Ocean: Day 48

On Monday... yes, Monday!! (feel free to call me a slacker!!)... we did another 20 minute clean up at Wrightsville Beach.  I've been procrastinating writing this blogpost for so many reasons.... but this morning I was given inspiration (on Facebook of all places) from my friend Harry who writes the blog "The Flotsam Diaries."... I guess I just needed a couple of days to sit on Access 20 and process everything that's been swirling through my head...

Access 20 is where my family and I picked up 1,833 cigarette butts in 20 minutes on September 19, 2010.. that was only our 11th clean up.  When I posted about that day... I remember feeling so sad and frustrated... I actually cried about what we removed from the beach that day.  BUT... then I was happy at the same time because it was in that post that I shared with you all that I had entered what I'm doing in the Brita FilterForGood Film Project... :)   If you haven't seen the film yet... please check it out and share.

(Also, I have so much gratitude for everyone who has commented and shared my project-- the film has been shared on Facebook 2,369 times!!!  YAY!!!  Thank you thank you thank you!!!!)

The only way any of this [litter problem] is going to change is if we help others become conscious to the problem.... this is what 20 minutes looked like on September 19...

Thankfully, we didn't remove that much of anything from Access 20 on Monday.  But we did remove a good amount of straws.  (Don't worry, I'm not going to rant today!! ;) )  

By now, I'm assuming that everyone knows that our family of five chooses to not use straws-- one of our many lessons and changes that we've made because of beach clean ups.  This morning I learned about a fourth-grader who has started a "campaign" of sorts to encourage people to go "Straw-Free."  Once he learned that over 500 million straws were used in the U.S. EVERYDAY... EVERYDAY!!... he stopped using straws and started the Straw-Free Project... check out the site and pledge to go straw-free for at least a month!!  (please)

 After reading my post about our 46th clean up, Jennifer-- who writes the blog Jennasaurus-- and a new resident of Wilmington (yay!!)... got inspired and headed out to Wrightsville Beach to do a beach clean up!!!  LOVE it!!!  Read her post about her beach clean up here: Making A Trip To The Beach Count

Now, that's some red lipstick!!!

20 minutes on March 7, 2011


Litter by weight: 5.8 oz
Cigarette butts: 76

A lot has changed since September.

Total amount of cigarette butts removed from Wrightsville Beach, NC in 48 days:

14,861

Our Daily Ocean: Day 11

On Saturday, my husband, three children and I headed out to Wrightsville Beach for yet another 20 minute beach clean-up... after not being able to find a parking spot at the access I really wanted to go to... we settled on Access 20:

Let me just say... I thoroughly believe that everything happens for a reason... we were supposed to go to Access 20.  I, obviously, had no idea how popular of an access it really is... but just looking at the trashcan there (overflowing) and looking at the other trashcans just a couple of accesses down (near empty)... it was obvious that Access 20 is a pretty popular hang out spot.  One trashcan doesn't seem to be enough for Access 20.

Look at all of those recyclables AND Lid? Lid??  Where's the lid??  Sara asks that same question often on The Daily Ocean.

It didn't take long for us to start finding cigarette butts... I think that our eyes are becoming trained to see the butts camouflaged in the sand.  While picking up some butts, some men told me thank you and then looked around and picked up the butts that they saw around them and added them to my bucket :D

The tide was going out and my husband and daughter found a patch of cigarette butts just like the 10x10 area that I came across on Day 10... a whole section of hundreds of butts.  But there wasn't just one section... there were patches all along the beach where we just sat down and scooped up butts by the handfuls.  Move all the sticks and grasses we found more butts underneath... running my fingers through the sand... even more.

There were so many patches of these cigarette butt "gold mines" that we split up to take them on.  As my husband was walking he passed by a bunch of "college"(??) guys.  My husband noticed one smoking and at his feet were a bunch of butts stuck into the sand.  My husband says to him:  "Hey man, you're not going to leave those there are you?"  And the guy replies, "Oh, no man, I'll take them with me... I was going to get them."  With that, my husband puts the butts in the guy's hand and says thanks.  (Yes, my husband ROCKS!!)

When I first started this whole collecting cigarette butt thing... I really just wanted to help bring more awareness to the problem of cigarette butt litter/pollution on my local beach with the hopes of helping to get a smoking ban passed. What I didn't expect was how bad the problem really is.  When I say that "we were supposed to go to Access 20"... I say that because for the first time since we started this, my kids were running to the buckets with handfuls of butts instead of just a few.  We sent our kids off with their own bucket and all 3 of our buckets were overflowing.  There were SO many butts that had we not had a time limit... there would have been no end in sight... it makes me sad.

BUT... even though I'm sad... I'm happy because I'm doing something about it.... I don't feel helpless about this issue.  AND... I want to do MORE... the other night, with inspiration given to me back at the beginning of this project from my good friend (Tracy you're my personal psychic ;) !!)....I entered the Brita FilterforGood Film Project.  Check out my entry here and voting begins on October 11!!

20*minutes on September 19, 2010


Litter picked up by weight:  3 lbs 7 oz


Cigarette butts: 1,833  (I didn't have time to be shocked by this number...I saw the buckets... I knew it was going to be a big number.  I keep saying to myself that I need a day where we just find 200... and I think that's a pretty sad thought... because 200 still sucks.)

Total amount of cigarette butts picked up off of Wrightsville Beach, NC in 11 days:

5,395

*My kids were sitting in a huge pile of cigarette butts when I said, "Time's up."  They looked up at me and said, "But MOM... we can't leave these here.  There's hundreds"  They were right.  I let them finish the section they were at... which took a little over 5 minutes longer.