As we welcome in the new year The Scottish Costal Clean Up are excited to announce plans to expand their volunteer program in 2025. Their goals include providing timely updates on beach cleaning and other volunteering opportunities and developing activities that are more inclusive and accessible. This will ensure that everyone who wants to contribute can find a role that suits them. If you have thoughts on how the team can make volunteering even more welcoming then please share your ideas with kerriesccu@balancedhorizon.org

This month The Scottish Costal Clean Up project coordinator Kerrie, had the opportunity to attend the Coastal Communities Network (CCN) gathering on the island of Great Cumbrae. The CCN is a coalition of groups dedicated to preserving Scotland’s coastal and marine environments and provides a platform for community organisations to access support on marine issues. Its mission focuses on connecting and empowering communities to protect and sustainably use coastal resources. The weekend consisted of workshops from shoreside biodiversity monitoring to using drones on beach cleans. It was also the ideal place to learn more about the struggles coastal communities are facing with Marine litter and how best the Scottish Coastal Clean Up can work alongside them to help remove it.

September saw The Scottish Costal Clean Up team return to the beautiful Inner Hebrides island of Ulva for the third year. A group of 12 volunteers braved some rather testing whether to remove an estimated 3.5 tonnes of plastic pollution from its shores. Thankfully, the wind held off just long enough for the team to use their boat Curlew to access some areas of the coast that are not easily accessible by foot. Ulva is a community owned island, with less than 20 full time residents and is a short boat ride off Mull. The team were given access to a bothy on the island to use as a base, a much appreciated retreat to return to after a long day of beach cleaning!

This month The Scottish Costal Clean Up team ventured to the Isle of Lewis in the Outer Hebrides. Despite its remote location and being known for its idyllic beaches, Lewis, like many coastal areas around Scotland is unfortunately also plagued by huge amounts of plastic pollution washing in onto its shores. The team mainly focused their beach cleaning to a stretch of coastline along the west coast and together with members of the Breanais community, were able to remove around 3 tonnes of marine litter. Many items cleared were not local, including large numbers of drink bottles from multiple countries!

This month saw the return of The Scottish Costal Clean Up‘s annual Big beach Clean event, which also coincided with World Ocean Day. As well as celebrating all things ocean, they also celebrated the many amazing people and organisations who work tirelessly to help keep Scotland’s beaches clean. As part of the Big Beach Clean they travelled to Port Logan to meet and beach clean with Solway Firth Partnership and local beach cleaning group O N US South West Scotland. They learnt about the difficulties they face in accessing some of the worse affected areas. It was also interesting to see the types of rubbish found on this stretch of coastline (which is flanked by the Irish sea), with plastic travelling up from the south, over from Ireland and many items that can be traced back to locations much further afield, like Canada.

The Scottish Costal Clean Up team are just back from a very busy weekend on the Isle of Skye. They returned to a familiar stretch of coastline, a place that was visited last year and they have already moved 6 tonnes worth of marine litter from it. A hardworking team of volunteers, including residents, Team Otter (an environment group for children) and members of a kayaking club, all worked together to remove two skip loads worth of rubbish, from two beaches. These beaches are not often visited by people, and everything found on them had been washed in. It is estimated that at least 90% of it is from the fishing industry. By removing plastic pollution from these areas, they are helping to protect local wildlife and from debris breaking down into microplastics.

This weekend The Scottish Costal Clean Up joined @sustainably.spectrum to attend the@bdmr_uk training at Rosemarkie Beach, on a mission to upskill and become qualified Marine Mammal Medics. This was the practical side of the training and involved learning how to best deal with a stranding situation or take care of seal pups that might require some extra help. If you’d like to know more about and find out ways you can get involved please click HERE.

Recently, The Scottish Costal Clean Up have been joining forces with great organisations like The Scottish Seabird centre in North Berwick, Keep Scotland beautiful and the Berwickshire Marine Reserve to help tackle the huge amounts of rubbish that has been washed in on the East Coast of Scotland. The winter storms have been particularly brutal this year and the team estimate that they have removed over 10 tonnes of washed-up creels and rope in East Lothian alone. Some of the team have recently completed their Powerboat handling level 2 course. The plan is to use their boat on upcoming beach cleans to access difficult locations, where it often isn’t possible or practical to remove any collected rubbish by land.

This month The Scottish Costal Clean Up joined Keep Scotland Beautiful for some source to sea litterpicking, to help bring awareness to the amount of marine litter that actual starts its life on land. This took place on the River Esk in Musselburgh. The amount of rubbish found along its banks was staggering, especially knowing how easily it could find its way into the river and then out to sea. The team have been continuing with our primary school visits and have been out beach cleaning locally when the weather allows. To participate in the North Berwick beach clean, which is taking place on March 2nd 11:00 – 12:30 please click HERE.

It’s been a busy start to the year for The Scottish Costal Clean Up team, with lots of planning taking place and a new staff member joining. They continue to busy removing creels (lobster pots) from east Lothian beaches and unfortunately seeing more being washed in with the recent storms. They have been running some incredibly fun workshops in primary schools and are planning to follow these up with beach cleans once the weather improves. The dates for their big beach cleaning weekends can be found on their website, with lots of beach cleans planned from early spring which you are encouraged to participate in.