Flotsam and Jetsam June 2017 Welcome to the Beach Forum quarterly e-bulletin. The Argyll and Bute Beach Forum is a project run by The GRAB Trust (as part of our Beaches and Marine Litter Project). Our main aim is to raise awareness of the impacts of and reduce beach and marine litter and to support communities to take action by cleaning beaches. We hope you will find our e-bulletin interesting. The bulletin is also available by post and on our website. Your contributions are always welcome. We want to make this bulletin as useful as possible. Tell us what you would like to see in the bulletin, it is your bulletin!

Beach Cleans—2017

Lots of beach cleaning has been carried out this year by our enthusiastic local groups in Argyll & Bute. We would like to thank everyone involved as they have worked hard to spruce up and improve our local area. Here are a few photos of some of them at work!

Lochgilphead Phoenix Group Lochgilphead Phoenix Group

Ardrishaig Church Eco-Group Ardrishaig Church Eco-Group © Argyllshire Advertiser © Argyllshire Advertiser

Loch Fyne Oysters (before) Loch Fyne Oysters (after)

Tayvallich Parent Council Tayvallich Parent Council

Craignish Parent Council

Craignish Parent Council Craignish Parent Council

Pirate Fun Day at Ettrick Bay

Still keeping very busy as always! One of our highlights has to have been our Pirate Fun Day! The committee entered into the spirit of the day and came dressed up as pirates to en- tertain the children. It was really successful, thanks to the fine weather and support from the local community. The owners of the Ettrick Bay Tearoom, Sandy and Alec Gibson, kindly gave us a donation of £1,000 on the day as thanks for the work we do. We were very touched by their generosity. We also raised an additional £204 from our raffle, donations and memberships.

Jolly Jim (MacCue) and crew - Beachwatch Bute Jessica Herriot and Alison Cross—Beachwatch Bute

Massive tug-o-war Fancy-dress pirates

GROUP BEACH CLEANS: Lots of beach cleans were carried out and also planned for the near future!

 We had a group of German exchange students who were in as part of the Youth Forum foreign trip. They took part in a beach litter survey and also a beach clean.

 The Rotary Club of were out for their annual beach clean with Beachwatch Bute.

 The pupils and staff of North Bute Primary School in

 The staff of the local Co-op store.

BEACHWATCH BUTE TRACTOR: Our tractor is look- ing fantastic thanks to the completion of essential maintenance work. We had to replace several parts due to damage by rust and general wear and tear. It has been resprayed and the charity logo has been re- newed. We could not have done this without the very generous help and support of Ewen Ferguson of Ardmaleish Boatyard on the island who carried out the work for us, the local charity For Bute who helped us with fund- ing and Malcolm Johnstone of Bute Signs.

JELLYFISH: Lots of Barrel jellyfish have 'landed' on the shores of Bute. We have shared photos and warned beach users to be careful. FACEBOOK: We now have 1,090 followers on Fa- cebook and posting lots of photographs and arti- cles. Still rated 5 star! MARINE LITTER: Over a tonne and a half delivered to landfill since our last meeting!

Sandra MacMillan—Beach Ranger (Beachwatch Bute)

Education update, April to June 2017

NEW PROJECT STAFF—Welcome Andrea and Ben

We are pleased to announce that the Beach and Marine Litter Education Project now has three education workers travelling the length and breadth of Argyll and Bute working with schools and groups to help turn the tide on marine litter and ocean plastics.

Ben Appleby is covering and Helensburgh areas, Andrea McShannon is working throughout Kintyre and Mid-Argyll and Janie Steele covers Oban, Lorn and the Isles.

We can offer workshops in school and help you to get out on to your local shore to clean it up and protect your local environment at the same time helping to make a positive impact nationally and globally. Additional- ly we can help you join in the national citizen science project ‘Beachwatch’ run by the Marine Conservation Society https://www.mcsuk.org/beachwatch

This summer term has seen us working with some old and new faces but warm thanks go out to everyone who has joined in the workshops and contributed to massive efforts in ridding the coastline and waters of as much marine and beach litter as we can. Remember, even when the going gets tough, every piece removed is one less piece which could potentially end up as food for an unsuspecting animal or result in some other injury of some kind.

We’ll have a full update for you in the next edition and look forward to seeing you after the summer break.

This summer saw the start of the For Our Shores cam- paign on Islay. We were lucky to have an amazing artist Barbara de Vries, on Islay for a full week as part of the start up. Barbara is a highly respected marine litter activ- ist who makes jewellery from marine litter selling to Holly- wood’s rich and famous. We had six workshops with our local schools in which our youngsters designed their jewellery and then sourced all the materials from their adopted beach. These workshops will be run bi-yearly by a local artist who shadowed Barbara’s work to further raise the profile of the work BeachWatch does on Islay and to add an extra dimension to beach cleaning. We would also like to partner with some of the other groups in Argyll and Bute to run jewellery-making workshops. Anyone inter- ested please email Sarah at forour- [email protected] Some of Barbara’s past endeavours include being a front cover model for Vogue, designing CK brand for Calvin Klein and designing for many famous brands from Ralph Lauren to Zandra Rhodes.

We are very lucky to have had sup- port from Mactaggart Third Fund to bring Barbara over from Miami and will work hard to ensure the legacy of this work is shared between us all. Barbara has been on beaches all over the world and we are delighted to share with you that Laggan Bay on Islay – 8 miles of beautiful white sand - has been described by Barbara as the most beautiful she has ever seen. Now there is something to be proud of, but we all know that our beaches are unique. And worth protecting!

We will keep the forum up to date on For Our Shores. It has been designed to roll out to any area operating a beach cleaning service. You can check out the new website at www.forourshores.org Watch this space!

‘Save the Date’

The GREAT BRITISH BEACH CLEAN 2017

Please note 15th-18th September 2017 n your diaries and watch out for more infor- mation at Beachwatch Home, joining the massive movement of wonderful volunteers throughout the UK. All data are collated and presented in a easily acces- sible format in November and can be downloaded on the website. Go to https://www.mcsuk.org/beachwatch and look for the big blue button.

The surveys are essential for keeping a tab on the litter situation in our seas and around our vast coastline. The data generated over the last two decades and more have enabled signifi- cant changes in legislation and we’re all working on tightening this up further. For example, the number of plastic bottles found on our beaches led to a petition to encourage the Gov- ernment to implement a Deposit Return Scheme for plastic bottles in Scotland; as you may know the Government agreed to consider it. An evidence meeting was held recently and more on this in the next newsletter. Together we can make a difference!

If you would like to get involved in the GBBC but are not sure how then please look at the Beachwatch website for more information; perhaps your local beach is registered and you could contact the organiser or contact the MCS Scotland Conservation Officer in Edin- burgh—[email protected] or on 0131 633 4000, who will give you further infor- mation and, where possible, put you in touch with a local volunteer Sea Champion to assist you in getting started. You may be able to register your clean now, as a public event or just your local group.

For schools and groups here in Argyll you can contact your local GRAB Education Project Worker in the first instance, who may be able to help or put you in touch with a local group. For those wanting to participate in Argyll and would like to borrow equipment, please let us know as soon as possible in order to ensure we have enough pickers and gloves! Drop us a line anyway to let us know your plans—let’s put Argyll on the map again this year!! Last year was the biggest yet and MCS want to beat this previous target which can only be a good thing for marine litter! Thanks to everyone who has contributed so far and welcome to the GBBC 2017 posse!

List of acronyms used in the bulletin

KSB: Keep Scotland Beautiful

HWDT: Hebridean Whale and Dolphin Trust

CMPP: Clyde Marine Planning Partnership

SEPA: Scottish Environmental Protection Agency

SAMS: Scottish Association for Marine Science

SNH: Scottish Natural Heritage

MCS: Marine Conservation Society

TEAR: Tiree Environmental Action and Recycling

GRAB Project Workers –

Julie Fairbrass (Project Manager) [email protected] Tel: 01631 569174

Janie Steele (Beaches & Marine Litter Project Worker—Oban, Lorn & The Isles) [email protected] Tel: 01631 567941

Andrea McShannon (Beaches & Marine Litter Project Worker—Mid-Argyll & Kintyre) [email protected] Tel: 01586 555297

Ben Appleby (Beaches & Marine Litter Project Worker—Dunoon & Helensburgh) [email protected] Tel: 01369 708515

Jean Kennedy—Administrator [email protected] Tel: 01546 604227

Please send articles for the Flotsam & Jetsam bulletin to Jean Kennedy.

All Project Workers are part-time so please note that they are not always avail- able to answer all queries in regard to beaches & marine litter issues. Beachwatch Bute Beach Ranger Sandra MacMillan—Bute Tel: 07767 795969 Re-Jig, Islay Beach Project Ina Glover— [email protected] Tel: 01496 810880 The Argyll and Bute Beach Forum The GRAB Trust c/o Argyll & Bute Council Kilmory Lochgilphead Argyll PA31 8RT Tel: 01546 604227 Web: grab.org.uk E-mail: [email protected]

Disclaimer Thanks for reading. Please note that all views expressed are not necessarily the views of The GRAB Trust or the Argyll and Bute Beach Forum. We hope that you have enjoyed our e-bulletin. We would like to hear from you and would appreciate any comments you may have about it.

The Argyll and Bute Beach Forum is funded by the following organisations: