A team of dedicated volunteers have unearthed and removed several tonnes of ‘ghost net’ littering a Co Down beach with help from a digger driver.
Discarded fishing and trawling nets are a serious threat to marine and wild life which can eat discarded nets or become entangled in their tendrels.
The East Coast ‘Ghost Net Gang’ uncovered an entire trawling net “including rusty steel warps” at Ballyfrench Strand near Portavogie on Sunday morning.
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Sea Shepherd volunteer and What The Sea Saw blogger, Aileen McClenaghan, told Belfast Live: “Ghost nets are a form of marine litter that has been around for decades - basically fishing nets that have either broken away from their parent vessels during trawling or been dumped at sea when they outlive their usefulness.
“Like an iceberg, a ghost net often shows only a tiny proportion of its mass on the surface - it could just be a cod end or a small section of mesh the size of a tennis net - but in this case an entire trawl, including rusty steel warps, was what lay beneath.
“It took a skilfully operated mini digger to drag several tons of sand-clogged net out of the beach, and the marine litter in question may have been there for many years - though being nylon it doesn’t break down either under the sea or under the sand.
“Discarded or lost ghost nets are a major threat to marine life and although commercial fishing practices are improving, the sea floor around our coasts is littered with this sort of detritus.”
Aileen praised all those who shared the call for volunteers, helped source the digger driver, the landowners who allowed it to be removed their field and Ards & North Down for agreeing to collect it.
Volunteers from six groups banded together for the effort to help tackle the serious issue of "ghost net" pollution along our coastline.
Aileen said they included volunteers from Ballyhalbert Community Association, Beach Cleaners Ards & North Down, Sea Shepherd NI, What The Sea Saw, the Ards Canal Path Group and Gareth Shaw Digger & Driver Hire.
She also urged anyone interested in helping clean up the Co Down coast to reach out to the Facebook pages of Beach Cleaners - Ards & North Down, Sea Shepherd Northern Ireland or What The Sea Saw.
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