Heal The Bay: Volunteering to Save Southern California’s Coastal Waters

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I’ve always loved volunteering. I’ve volunteered on a suicide hotline, tutored a homeless child, feed the homeless, and currently I’m a Heal the Bay Ambassador. Heal the Bay is a volunteer program that focuses on beach clean ups, water regulation, and educating the public on ways to keep our beaches clean and safe for not only humans, but for sea animals.

After going thru the initial training day, I learned many alarming things. I learned that when a balloon is released into the sky, it pops in the atmosphere shredding the rubber so that when it falls into the ocean, it very closely resembles a jelly fish. When this happens, fish that feast on jellyfish unknowingly ingest it and die.

Also, during training, the trainer began to throw around an inflatable ball that had the design of the world globe on it. She told each person who caught the ball to catch it with their fingers. Each person was then supposed to count how many fingers were on the ocean. About 90% of the time was 7 fingers. This exercise was to show us that 70% of the earth is covered with water. This was an astounding realization for me.

Then she went on to talk about how everything, and I mean everything you come across in your day that doesn’t make it to the trash can, cups, cigarette butts, wrappers, etc. after rainfall ALL end up in the ocean. All end up potentially being ingested by birds, fish, and other sea animals. Again, just think about that. 70% of the land is covered by water. Think of how many hundreds of thousands of sea animals are affected by what you do and don’t do every single day. It’s truly a sobering thought.

For example, we were shown a picture of a bird that had died and found inside its body was everything from cigarette lighters, glass, plastic, and pens. These unsuspecting animals think they’re ingesting food, and instead, they’re eating everything you haven’t thrown in the trash can. How much time does it take to really make sure all your trash goes into the garbage can?

At a Heal the Bay event, I met a little 12 year old girl who told me she went to a beach cleanup the day before and she found more trash right NEXT to the trashcan then inside the can. She found baby’s diapers and more cigarette butts than she could remember. Is this really the footprint we want to leave on this planet?

Still another important thing for you to keep in mind, because all that pollution is swept into the ocean, you should not go into the ocean until AT LEAST three days after a rainstorm.

I’ve only been volunteering for Heal the Bay for a month now, but it’s really changed my perspective on many things. If you’re interested, for more information check out: http://www.healthebay.org

Joie Schmidt © Copyright 2010 All Rights Reserved.

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Dreams of the Heart – volume I by Joie Schmidt is available:

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