clean up question

[geoff w]

I've done several coastal cleanups. In general, things like metal or plastic signs, golf balls, metal debris, fishing gear and tackle, etc. is trash that won't benefit marine life, particularly things like lead fishing weights. Plastic bottle tops and especially plastic don't do much good for the marine environment, with plastic bags more likely to kill critters than provide a safe home. Lots of other things provide some kind of home to sea life and you should give some thought before ridding the ocean of such. At one coastal cleanup, I pulled a partly buried folding chair from the sand, and an octopus came out with it and quickly darted away. One man's trash is another sea creature's treasure

 

[bowlofpetunias]

IMHO if people get nothing else out of this than understanding just how complex this issue it ... it is a very worth while thread. I did a lot of research on Artificial reefs.. pros and cons perhaps I should copy that an post it as a blog here too

Even the experts get things wrong until they can work out what is right. I was fortunate enough to meet and have an in depth discussion with some marine biologists who are working on determining how fish see! Initially I thought.. "REALLLY.. who cares.. there are so many more important things to study!" They explained their goal was to find out how marine creatures see so they could work on a safe additive to make plastics look less like jellyfish and food to discourage marine creatures from eating it! What a great concept! They said similar research had resulted in changes to the plastic bottle caps and rings that birds had been eating and it stopped them from eating them! That research can not come to fruition fast enough for our oceans.

We need to educate but there will always be the lazy, can't be bothered, don't care humans... multi pronged approaches are always best!

 

[bowlofpetunias]

I transferred this info over from some research I did a year or so ago about artificial reefs. It is longish but you may find it interesting. It was too long for the blog her so I finished the info in the first comment section.

Ships as Artificial Reefs: A Layman's Investigation - Blogs - ScubaBoard - Scuba Diving Forum - Diving Social Network

 

[maderadiver]

I transferred this info over from some research I did a year or so ago about artificial reefs. It is longish but you may find it interesting. It was too long for the blog her so I finished the info in the first comment section.

Ships as Artificial Reefs: A Layman's Investigation - Blogs - ScubaBoard - Scuba Diving Forum - Diving Social Network

That was a good read thanks for linking

One question i had was right at the end it talked about government ultimately approving or denying reef being placed


I for the lire of me can not find anything of who is actually the authorities on this seems a mixture of local government environmental divisions and sometimes direct governer permission who actually has " domain" over say california near water reefs

 

[bowlofpetunias]

Yes sometimes bureaucracy can be baffling for sure. I have had occasions where I wound up insisting on several departments taking documentation because they were all point their fingers at each other as the one responsible so I figured bury them all with paperwork