Data: CSIRO’s Dr Chris Wilcox works with Clonard student Chelsea Leissner.
JOHN VAN KLAVEREN
GEELONG secondary students have formed a pilot group for a national beach debris survey.
CSIRO researchers have trained the Clonard College students in survey techniques and uploading their data to a national scientific database.
Project leader Dr Denise Hardesty hoped other community and school groups would join the project.
The survey aimed to measure marine debris and its impact on aquatic life, Dr Hardesty said.
“All the data collected is included on a national debris map overlaid with wildlife distribution patterns for marine species like birds, fish and turtles,” she said.
“This allows researchers to pinpoint the type of rubbish most dangerous to particular species.”
Dr Hardesty and her team stop every 100 kilometres to survey areas of coastline.
“Different beaches have different types of litter depending on location and currents,” she said.
“Isolation doesn’t necessarily mean a beach is free of litter. We often find rubbish that is not local or even of Australian origin.
“It’s an ambitious project but has real meaning and relevance to everyday life.”
Clonard teacher Jenny Edwards said an interesting part of the project involved debris with barcodes, enabling the product to be traced back through the distribution chain.
“It’s like a message in bottle, except the message is encoded” Ms Edwards said.
“It gives us information about where the product originated and how it may have travelled to the coast.”
Ms Edwards said the project fitted in with the school’s curriculum with topics like oceanography, biology, biodiversity and biochemistry.
“We weren’t expecting to find much at Breamlea because it’s a more-remote beach but we were surprised by what we discovered, including dead wildlife.”
Ms Edwards will present Clonard’s involvement in the project to teacher group Barwon Environment Network.
She said students would monitor Breamlea for the next year to collect more data for uploading to the TeachWild National Marine Debris portal at ala.org.au.
