Living in a highly developed industrial society and heading out for a day sail holds no problems for containment of rubbish, but is a fabulous trial for how you would manage waste on a longer voyage.

The ocean has a limited capacity to clean up our waste products.

Plates and cups – when having a party, ask guests to bring their own cup, plate and cutlery so they can take them home again and also save on the washing up. Avoid throw-away paper or plastic cups and plates.

Remember the “sailor’s etiquette”, if you take a bottle or two of your favourite beverage to another boat for drinks, take the empty bottle/s back to your boat, otherwise your hosts are left with a large quantity of empties to store.

When buying provisions, choose high-nutrient value food and little packaging. Leave as much packaging as possible at home.

Consider best options for bathing, washing up detergent and washing detergent – use only phosphate free and low sodium products.

bath soap: as you don’t get very dirty on board, go for a water bath without soap

washing up detergent: Sunlight, Earth Choice

laundry detergent: Sunlight, Lux Flakes

‘biodegradable’ does not mean phosphate free.

Glass bottles and jars can be discarded overboard, make sure you break bottles so the bits will sink and choose an area of  deep water, over 30 metres. Consider recycling, jars have 1000′s of uses as reusable containers, keeping screws tidy and decanting small quantities of varnish or paint amongst a few.

Cans and tins – Many tins and cans are now lined with plastic making the disposal of them overboard now longer viable, check the labelling to ensure any can you discard is not plastic lined.  Tins that are plastic lined – cut top and bottom off tins and flatten to condense rubbish.

Most paper and cardboard can be burned safely in small, hot fires made below the high tide line on beaches.

Refuelling from jerry cans at sea can be very difficult, take the utmost care, place rags to catch any spill and keep them safely on board until they can be disposed of correctly ashore.

Store food in re-usable sealable containers – no cling wrap (appears very like jellyfish to turtles and seabirds)– use waxed paper to cover leftovers if not being stored in containers

Toilet – keep anything not from your body out of the system, and use recycled toilet paper to save trees. Anything else with clog the toilet system, requiring it to be taken apart and repaired, put it into the rubbish collection.

Recover all cigarette butts, fishing line, ring pulls, old synthetic rope.

Hypothesis

Consider you are visiting a coral or sand island.  You take 6 bottles of softdrink ashore, and cheese and biscuits to share amongst yourselves and any visitors to your camp.

Mmmmmm lovely.  Now 6 empty bottles, foil cheese wrapper and plastic biscuit packet.  Can’t burn them, can’t bury them – very pristine beach belonging to another culture, must take them back to the boat.

Presuming where you shop, there will be refuse facilities.  So, maybe glass bottles are preferable or aluminium cans. Cheese can be unwrapped at the shop and stored in muslin.  Biscuits can be taken out of packet and stored in airtight glass or tupperware container.  Avoid waste, rather than have to deal with it on the voyage where you can’t discard it.

Resource

http://www.thegreendirectory.com.au/green-business/house-and-home/cleaning-products/austech-products-pty-ltd/details.html Orange Power cleaning-products available at IGA and other major grocery outlets.

Reef Check Australia would like to make you aware of an exciting media and environmental opportunity to Adopt a Reef through the new Corporate Giving Program. Read the rest of this entry »

Last week, some of the crew from OceansWatch Australia caught up with Mike Cormier who had been crew on the OceansWatch Caribbean Project 2011, which left the Canary Islands and visited Trinidad, Grenada, Union Island, Bequia, St. Lucia, Dominica, Antigua, Montserrat, Sint Maarten and now the Dominican Republic, the final island for this assignment, where after talking to the locals, one crew member said: “I was really shocked to find out about their trash problems. With the water runoff from rain, city trash runs right into the sea yet locals think this is caused by cruisers”.  So here was an opportunity for PR and action.

Skipper Andy Clarkson said “After being based in Grenada, and spending two and a half years in the Caribbean some years back it has been great to return to this area and become involved with this project.  I just cannot believe how small and few the fish are becoming, and it’s hard to see all the reef damage. As well as the coral bleaching events that occur due to sea temperature rises and acidification, human influence and overfishing alongside bad fishing practices has compounded the problem to a point where if continued the effects could be irreversibly catastrophic.”

The main issues were uniting the groups already existing among the Caribbean to educate and make others aware of the huge difficulties in waste disposal, climate change issues including coral bleaching, and overfishing – familiar to us in the Pacific as well, and the possibility of developing Marine Conservation Areas.  Lots of contacts were made, and future projects discussed to assist the concerned locals to begin to find ways to raise awareness and educate locals and visitors concerning the improved health of these heavily trafficed Caribbean islands.

For the full story http://blogs.oceanswatch.org/caribbean/

“OceansWatch Australia”

While you have been quietly sailing the oceans, preparing a picnic or being part of changing the world, we have become “OceansWatch Australia” – the Australian arm of OceansWatch International. Our wonderful Solicitors, Cooper Grace Ward, held our hand through this process.

OW Educational Tour: A fantastic opportunity to get involved:

We are organizing a educational tour with Chris Bone on one of the Oceanswatch project boats, from Cairns to Sydney for 6 to 8 weeks from the beginning of October this year.

We are looking for volunteers to help with the tour, we need assistance to organize the presentations in each town and we need crew to help on the boat as it sails down the coast.

Members have the chance to sail on one of the OW project boats, spread the word of our work and work with the OceansWatch team.  Contact Melinda Taylor at melinda@oceanswatch.org for more information.

OceansWatch members – Chris is still looking for crew for this year’s projects. If you are a member. If you are not a member – here’s how to join

Success with the Tuo communities MPA
“We can’t believe our eyes – fish are coming close to the beach.”

WE ARE MAKING A DIFFERENCE. We are finding the formulas, getting the support, attracting the people, building momentum. It is working

Tuo village already knew it wanted to establish an MPA. The village fishermen were clearly aware of declining catches and the additional effort it took to feed their families.

As in Rennell, rapidly growing populations were severely taxing the marine resources they relied on to feed them. Moreover, the community’s main source of income, the sale of marine products (fish, beche-de-mere, shells, etc.), was in decline. They had also noted salination of the wells, changes in the coral in their surrounding reefs and clearly understood the implications, if not the actual reasons, for these changes. Lawrence, like Willie before him, was hoping OceansWatch could help.

OceansWatch made its initial visit to Tuo in early June 2010. The community had already decided to establish an MPA and was seeking OceansWatch’s advice as to the suitability of the marine area they had chosen to conserve. Lawrence explained that the “community was very much behind the plan and welcomed OceansWatch assistance. The community wanted to do it. OceansWatch provided technical assistance and support.” He explained that OceansWatch helped immensely by holding meetings that included training about fish awareness and climate change; discussions of old fishing methods by the village elders that led to decisions to ban gill nets and diving at night; and teacher training to help teach children about the environment, conservation, and climate change. Lawrence also noted that the “discussions of old methods from the old men—about wind, fishing patterns, and sailing” were particularly rewarding because these were things that most of the community members had never heard before.

Get educated!!!

Watch the video from the Australian Marine Conservation Society website.

OceansWatch Australia member Shannon Gordon has just returned from sailing across the Pacific Ocean, an opportunity which came about through her involvement with OceansWatch.

“Never in a million years did I think I would ever sail across the Pacific, but when the opportunity came up I grabbed it!” Considering she only started sailing a year ago Shannon really jumped in at the deep end.

“When I knew that I was going to be making the trip I decided to use the opportunity to fundraise for OceansWatch. I emailed my friends and family and sent them reports on my training, which included courses in sea survival and navigation.

“I gave presentations at work and approached the local IGA supermarket for help. IGA donated four boxes of chocolate fish* which I sold to raise money. I spread the word about OceansWatch and ended up raising over $1300.”

The highlights of Shannon’s sailing trip included the Panama Canal crossing and visiting the Galapagos Islands. The journey took over three months and covered more than 7000 nautical miles.

“My sailing trip was an amazing experience. I want to encourage members to think creatively about ways to fundraise, as every little bit helps. Raising the money was great but the support and encouragement I got from friends and family was incredible. It really highlighted for me that when you give, you receive.”

* chocolate covered marshmallow, shaped as fish – a Kiwi delicacy

This photo was taken by Shannon Gordon on her recent Pacific Ocean Fundraising Adventure. It clearly illustrates how some developing coastal communities, like Bali, need help to preserve their precious resources !

This video from Natural Resources Defence Council shows another result of increased carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere.

Life on earth is dependent on the health and stability of our oceans. Most of us are aware that climate change is causing rising global temperatures, rising sea-level and coral bleaching. However, there is a less publicised climate change crisis which is predicted to have profound impacts on the health and stability of the oceans, and therefore on life as we know it.

It is called ocean acidification, it is caused by carbon pollution and it is about to make things a whole lot harder for the planet’s terrestrial and aquatic life.

The Australian Marine Conservation Society – Acidification of the Oceans

Throw on your Hawaiian shirt and come along!!!

To all of our wonderful Oceanswatch Australia tribe!  This Saturday night (the 12^th March) we are hosting an event at the Sunshine Coast Yacht Club in Mooloolaba to promote Oceanswatch and to support Lisa Blair (www.LisaBlairSailstheWorld.com ) in preparing for her exciting Clipper 2011-2012 Sail around the World adventure!  It should be a great night with our OW members, yachties and marine enthusiasts!  Below is the invite and if you are close by, please come along – it will be a great chance for us to all meet each other and have a drink together. The OceansWatch Team.

Members are welcome to come from 4pm to join us in sharing the vision and mission of Oceanswatch and learning about some of our sister organisations that are working with us (Reefcheck and Coralwatch) to help preserve the marine environment.  You will soon be able to do/be involved in the following:

• Whale research support vessels Niue
• Whale research support vessels Fiji
• Whale research support vessels Palau
• Turtle tagging Fiji
• Coral Watch surveying worldwide
• Reef Check surveying Melanesia (follow-up community visits and expedition team support)
• Reef Check surveying Caribbean (from late 2011)
• Coral gardening Caribbean (from late 2011)
• Support vessel for documentary film crew SW Pacific
• Haiti aid supplies support vessels
• Schools supplies transport SW Pacific
• Engineers, doctors, nurses etc worldwide in response to community request

You are invited to join Chris Bone, founder of OceansWatch International and a tribe of OceansWatch supporters and friends for a special event to learn more about OceansWatch and to farewell our member, Lisa Blair, OceansWatch International Education Ambassador who leaves for London shortly to join the Clipper Round the World race, the world’s longest yacht race!

Discover OceansWatch, meet great people, have a great time and learn how you can get involved with this great cause.

Saturday 12th March 6:30 pm, Sunshine Coast Yacht Club, 33 Parkyn Parade, Mooloolaba.

Special guests Bruce and Suzanne Arms, trans Tasman record holders and project managers for Jessica Watson’s trip

Hawaiian theme so dig out your best Hawaiian Shirt and Sarong.

For OceansWatch members only, you are invited to join the OceansWatch Australia team at  1pm to hear talks about some of the trainings that are available to members and how to get fully involved helping both ashore and on the water.

RSVP Kym Lincolne, kym@oceanswatch.org or reply here in a comment