An army of volunteers have been working tirelessly in north Queensland to ensure turtle hatchlings have one less obstacle to overcome — literally.
Last week's severe rain in the Mackay region sent vegetation and rubbish down local waterways.
Coupled with king tides, it left mounds of debris stretching for kilometres along local beaches — right at the peak of turtle hatching season.
Steve Fisher from Mackay and District Turtle Watch said volunteers had been working twice a day to clear pathways.
"It's not just a matter of finding the nests, putting them in a bucket and letting them go in the water," he said.
"That doesn't work.
"Hatchlings need to actually cross the beach to take like a GPS magnetic imprint so it [a hatchling] can come back to its beach."
Mr Fisher said, thankfully, no hatchlings had been found dead in the debris, but volunteers had successfully released a number that had been caught.
"Hatchlings will climb a fair bit," he said.
"They're amazing little critters, but there's no way they were going to make it through all that debris," he said.
An ongoing problem
While much of the debris washed up on beaches had been weeds and vegetation, there had also been some worrying finds.
"We have the remains of a boat that broke up and someone had been living on it, so their entire life washed up along the beach," Mr Fisher said.
"We've had a a 20-litre drum of unopened Roundup, lots of residential rubbish, tyres, refrigerators and plastic."
Mr Fisher worried that if the rubbish was not cleared, it would get buried by sand and break down into microplastics.
He said collecting the rubbish was only part of the issue.
"Once we collect it, we've got nowhere to place it," Mr Fisher said.
"We've asked for [Mackay Regional] Council to come down and give us a hand … but they referred us to Maritime Safety Queensland.
"Some of our volunteers and members took some rubbish to the dump, but they've been told they have to pay to do that."
Mackay Regional Council was contacted for comment.
Mysterious items washed up
Among the curious items found along northern Harbour Beach was a wooden log with a brass plaque.
It bore the name of Australia's 10th prime minister, Joseph Lyons, and included the dates of his leadership, 1932-1939, and the number 10.
A public call-out to discover where the marker came from has provided no clues.
"It may have been from the Pioneer River, or it may have been in the water from down south for six months, eight months, a year … it could be from Sydney, we don't know," Mr Fisher said.
What was clear, however, is that the effort to clear the beaches would continue for some time, with another set of king tides due early next month.
