The team of six hikers collected more than 14,500 records of plastic pollution using a combination of five research methods. Front row from left to back row: Liz Bazin, Chris Leggatt, Mandy Pelser, Ariadne van Zandbergen, Jonathan Britton. (Photo provided)
“Come and see,” Jonathan Britton called over the wind and roar of the waves rolling back from the sloping pebble beach.
He was sitting on a plastic kayak, red as a mailbox. Its bow was buckled and split, and goose barnacles sprouted from the water.
He pointed out a sticker in the drink holder from a Storms Estuary-based adventure company. Chris Leggatt knew the owner and sent him a message asking when the kayak was lost. A few minutes later, a reply came: “Wasted into the sea on August 10th.''
In less than 10 weeks, the kayak had drifted more than 400 kilometers and washed up west of Suiderstrand, the southernmost tip of Africa.
Britton was one of six members of the 2024 Strandloper Project hike, which took place over 12 days in October.
The project began with a desire to learn more about the impacts of recreational fishing along the Southern Cape coastline, and since 2018 has grown into a series of coastal surveys investigating the density and distribution of marine plastic waste.
The day we discovered our kayak was the 11th day of our coastal research expedition, and we have already recorded one record of marine plastic waste stranded, ranging from lids, suction cups, toothbrushes, buckets, wooden boxes, and other hard plastics. More than 3,000 items were collected. Even soft plastics like shopping bags, dog poop bags, and condoms.
There were plastic bottles, pieces of polystyrene and plastic cutlery. Some beaches were covered with a film of microplastics, which are decomposed debris from numerous plastic containers, and nurdles, a raw material used to make all the plastic products we use every day. .
In 12 days, we completed a 228km hike along the coastline from Pringle Bay to Stoisbaai, documenting plastic and fishing debris.
By combining five research methods to classify plastic types and determine their density and distribution along coastlines, our aim was to determine the sources of plastic pollution and where they enter the ocean. .
The list of items suggests that most of the plastic that washes up on beaches originates from urban settlements, flows through municipal infrastructure into the ocean, and is washed away from rivers during floods.
The density, shape, and size of an item, driven by wind and ocean currents, affect how far certain types of plastic drift and where they end up washing up. Along the sections of coastline hiked during this expedition, the majority of plastic was recorded on the west-facing coastline, with lower densities on the east-facing portions.
The 2022 Arniston to Hermanus expedition recorded the highest monofilament density of the four expeditions at that stage.
Once again this year, this 228 km section of coastline ranks as the highest concentration of monofilaments along the 1,050 km coastline surveyed between Pringle Bay and Cape Recife.
Lost recreational fishing gear gets caught in kelp handles (or stems), becoming entangled with seabirds and fish respectively, and posing a ghost fishing threat. Furthermore, when monofilaments are exposed to UV light and degrade, they remain in the marine ecosystem as microplastics.
Among the items that drifted further than the kayak were medical packaging and snack sachets released from a container lost at sea during a storm off East London.
Packaging and snacks began washing up in Port Alfred on September 9th and along the Garden Route on September 19th. They had drifted more than 500 miles (840 km) when they began washing ashore near Pearly Beach in the second week of October.
These particular items came from ships that were rerouted around Cape of Storms due to conflicts in the Middle East.
In addition to examining plastics and fishing gear, we also take the opportunity to document marine animals. The species for which we collected valuable data is the African black oystercatcher.
This year we recorded 1,204 birds, with an average density of 5.3 birds/km. This is an increase of 6.4% for the 2021 expedition to the section of coastline between Stoisbaai and Grotto Beach.
To stem the flow of plastic into the ocean, both local governments and society need to change the way they manage plastic waste.
Our future requires a paradigm shift towards using plastic waste as a resource and commoditizing collection and upstream processes.
For more information, visit www.stroperproject.org or email Expedition Leader Mark Dixon. [email protected]
