Posts from the ‘Eco’ category

Save 10 Movement Featured in Slide Magazine

By

Surfwanderer is stoked to see our senior writer, Shawn Tracht’s main eco cause, Save 10, being picked up by the surf community.  Check out the latest issue of Slide Magazine to view The Surfwanderer’s Save 10 Movement featured in the “Lost Waves” section of the magazine on page 14!

Here’s a sample, we’d love for you to purchase a copy.  Slide is sold at many surf shops, Barnes and Noble, and more.

SLIDE_24_FC copy Shawn Tracht writes for Slide Magazine

The most important part of the journey, however, is not just getting the word out, it’s getting the movement going.  When you’re walking up and down your beaches, please Save just 10 pieces of trash from going into the water and our environment.

Remember, we’re all in this together.  It’s gross, it’s not your trash, and you don’t want to pick it up…trust me.  But get over it, Save 10, and wash your hands when you get to the showers.

Shaka,

Surfwanderer

Leave a comment

Non-Fantastic Plastic

By

Our new friend Allison Morris was part of a group who created this graphic for recycling and plastic pollution. We thought it fit perfect for our thoughts on the ills of plastic and a need to keep trying to make our environment better.

See more at http://www.onlineeducation.net/2012/12/17/fantastic-plastic

In today’s consumer world, plastic is everywhere—from plentiful stores of bottled water to disposable plasticware to the containers that hold our store-bought food. It seems like you can’t go out shopping without running into a good deal of plastic. And while this material is strong, reliable, and undoubtedly useful, we also may have way too much of the stuff that isn’t being reused. Recycling plastic uses much less energy than creating new plastic, and it conserves our valuable resources. Despite this, however, only about a third of our material that could be recycled actually is. Among younger generations, the problem of our overconsumption of plastic has been prevalent for as long as some can remember, and yet little has changed or progressed in alleviating the problem. Statistically, people in the Millennial generation (today’s high schoolers, college students, and young adults) are much less likely to properly recycle plastic and other materials than those in older generations. If you’re of student or Millennial age, take a look at the following infographic—the reality is that younger generations need to start getting serious about recycling, or the future will be robbed of some very valuable resources.

Plastic Infographic

1 Comment

Save 10! Summer Trash Clean Up!

By

Save 10 Movement 

By Shawn Tracht/Surfwanderer.com

Perfect waves have been breaking like this for centuries.  What happened to this picture?

So this week was the week of the 4th of July, and all of us who live near the ocean know how much those who don’t live near the ocean trash our beaches.  It’s sad.  It’s like the visitors who show up for the 4th and the summer months think they’re showing up to a ball game, and the stadium staff are going to clean up all their trash for them after the game.  They don’t understand that every little wrapper, plastic top to their water bottles, paper napkins, and plastic grocery bags are fifty yards away from the waters edge, and fifty yards away from being the killers of ocean animals, which eventually, through the food chain, will come back to haunt and effect us.

In a few of our other Save 10 articles on Surfwanderer, (which can be found under the “Eco” tab on the navigation bar) we’ve illuminated what is know as the Great Pacific Garbage Patch: what they say is approximately a collection of trash that is twice the size of Texas!

So this then puts the task up for grabs as to who is going to save that trash from going into the ocean before it hits our waters.  Now trust me, it’s gross, it’s not mine, and I don’t want to pick it up!  However, too bad!  I have no choice.  This is the ocean and the beaches that I love.  I don’t want to be a trash collector though, so I have to have attainable goals and ask for help.

The Save 10 Movement just asks all of us to “Just Save 10 Pieces of Trash” from going into the ocean every time you’re at the beach.  Trust me, there is so much trash that you’re going to want to pass up this trashy experience, but please, just do a little part, you can wash your hands when you’re done!  We all know who to blame, and we all know it’s totally gross.  We are all infuriated, but if we continue to not help clean it up, even though we didn’t do it, we will only live in our own trash.  As Jennifer Blonder from the Surfrider Foundation stated on ESPN radio, “even if you just pick up one piece of trash, just to get into the movement!  Anything is better than nothing, and you’re doing your part is doing us all a favor.”

The Save 10 Movement is about doing what we can when we can and leading by example.  So do whatever you can stomach each day, as in picking up trash at your beach.

Shaka, Save 10

Please!  Leave your own stories and comments below to help the movement gain strength!

1 Comment

Save 10

By

Save 10 Movement 

By Shawn Tracht/Surfwanderer.com

Perfect waves have been breaking like this for centuries.  What happened to this picture?

Listen, it doesn’t matter how the trash got there.  It’s there everyday and that’s something we are living with. However, calm down and don’t get overwhelmed.  Just Save 10 pieces of trash from going on the beach each day and spread the word.  Just do the little things you can and we’ll see some positive change.  Movements take time, so do your part and others will take notice.

When I walk by dirty trash, what goes through my mind is this,” the trash on the beach is not mine, it’s gross, and I shouldn’t have to pick it up…but I need to get over it, Save 10, and do my part.  The ocean needs our help!”

Shaka Save 10.

Leave a comment

Save 10-Save 10 Pieces of Trash from going into the Ocean

By

The entire idea, or mantra of Save 10 comes from the idea of Saving Trash from going into the ocean, and eventually making it to the mouths of birds, sea life, and into the eco-system.  Much of this trash is ending up, especially the plastic, which is a 0 % bio-degradable substance (yes, that’s right, plastic never bio-degrades, it’s stays with us for ever, BPA (mega-toxic shi% used to mold and make plastic is one of the most lethal parts of plastic) gets in our waters and into our fish, and then we eat them)!  It’s a big ugly cycle.

Below, please take time to watch the video.

Saving 10 to me breaches eco-friendly territory of helping the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, which if you’re unfamiliar, is a floating collection of broken down trash, much unnoticeable actually from the air when you fly over, which is a collection of trash that is twice the size of Texas.  Two Texas’ worth of trash!

To see more, click here.

Leave a comment

Save 10- Plastic Pollution

By

Ryan Allshouse finds some weird circular plastic ring hanging out in the reef below his local surf break.   Disgusted but determined, he grabbed it and took it up to the trash can.  It’s amazing how many times in my life I walked by pieces of trash like this and said to myself, “Man, somebody needs to pick that up!  I can’t believe people let this happen!”

The Save 10 movement came from a personal awakening one day that it didn’t matter where the trash came from or how it got in front of me at that exact present moment.  I could be mad at the world and it’s people for letting trash get to the beach and into the ocean, but every time I walked by and pick up this trash, because it was gross, or not mine, or whatever…  every time I left it on the beach out of disgust for my other fellow human beings, I was letting it into the ocean when I could have saved it from polluting our earth.  I had the epiphany one day that I was just as much of the problem for complaining, but not helping solve any problems.

So, the idea of Save 10 is this:  Save 10 pieces of trash from going in the ocean every time you surf, either on your way to the water, or on your way back to your car.  On a lucky day, like this one, you may only find one piece of trash, but with the mindset to Save 10, and encourage others to do it as well, we’re doing a part that fits into our real schedule.  WE ARE BUSY PEOPLE,  AND ASKING EACH OTHER TO DO BEACH CLEAN UPS  EVERYDAY IS NOT REALISTIC.  So just Save 10, or whatever you can find, and spread the word.  Don’t overwhelm yourself, just do a little part and the beach will be that much better off.

Not only is Ryan a great surfer, but he cleans the beach too! Photo: Jason Rath

Leave a comment

Save 10- On A SUP

By

Fletcher Burton Saves 10 while surfing one evening on his SUP, “Not good!” he kept repeating. “Not good. Shaka Save 10.”

Look, the dang trash is floating in our waters all around. It’s kind-of gross, it’s not ours, and we don’treally want to have to stuff it in our wetsuits until after our session; but get over it.  The ocean needs us.

Shaka Save 10

Leave a comment

Save 10- Send Us Your Success Stories and Photos!

By

Remember, none of us signed up to be trash men and women on the beach, however, the ocean and earth need us.  The Save 10 movement is about setting reasonable, attainable goals, “save ten pieces of trash from going in the ocean each time you’re at the beach or in nature,” and share your story and vibe with others.

Photographer Javier Delgado Saved 10 today, and shared his success story:

“It’s amazing how just by leading by example today Saving “my” 10, how many other surfers saw me, and couldn’t help but partake.  It sucks that this trash is on the beach, but it’s there.  Whether it’s from the college partiers who were here yesterday, the birds who often feed in the trash and litter the beach, or whatever, the trash was there, so I saved it from going in our ocean.

Shaka Save 10!

Javi

This is the trash I picked up today for my Save 10 contribution.  It wasn’t much…until a few surfers followed my lead and began picking up their share as well!

Here’s the trash that other surfers picked up, following my lead.  I was stoked they pitched in.  Shaka Save 10!

Leave a comment
Follow

Get every new post delivered to your Inbox.

Join 1,939 other followers

%d bloggers like this: