The Holden Beach Turtle Patrol held its first-ever beach sweep July 19 with volunteers picking up 120 pounds of trash off the Brunswick County island’s ocean shoreline.
Each of the 40 volunteers who turned out for the event spent between 40 minutes to an hour collecting trash, gathering a host of plastics from commercial store bags, food wrappers and bottles to cigarette butts, paper and cardboard scraps, Holden Beach Turtle Watch Program member Donna McGowan said in an email.
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The beach sweep was hosted during the peak of sea turtle nesting season, which generally runs from May through the end of October.
“It is important to keep Holden Beach clean and safe for everyone, but especially for nesting female sea turtles and their new hatchlings,” a patrol release states. “Sea turtles crawling along the beach can be impeded by trash and or worse they can become ensnared in it and die.”
There are currently 33 sea turtle nests on Holden Beach’s ocean shoreline, down 64 from last year, according to McGowan.
“Nesting at our local beaches has been low this year,” she said in the email. “Sea turtles don’t lay every year, rather they lay every 2-3 years so maybe it’s normal to have a low year. August is a busy month with new nests and hatching for existing nests. We are hopeful to get a few more nests before the season ends.”
Another beach sweep is being planned for September. Details for that sweep will be announced at a later date.
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The nonprofit hosts informational programs about sea turtles every Wednesday through August at the Holden Beach Chapel.
