Sea monster takes off at Ōtaki Kite Festival

Around 250 little and not-so-little helpers turned rubbish into art at Ōtaki Kite Festival, building a spectacular Sea Monster on the beach to highlight the issue of ocean pollution.

Paraparaumu Beach artist JoAnna Mere built the body of the monster, then invited festival goers to attach items of rubbish found during beach and park clean-ups and from festival bins, to create the creature’s wings.

“My motivation for creating the community Sea Monster Project comes from my belief that we can all be kaitiaki, because we are all the people of this land. The beach is our marae atea, as we work together on environmental solutions for issues like the plastic in our oceans,” JoAnna says.

The creation of the sea monster was kicked off with a beach-clean up on Ōtaki Beach on the Saturday morning of the Kite Festival. The timing also marked the end of Seaweek , which saw a record number of community beach clean-ups throughout the district. During the three weeks from 18 February to 7 March, over 400 people took part in ten events organised by schools, community groups and businesses, collecting around 25 bags full of rubbish. Kāpiti Coast District Council supported these clean-ups by providing gloves and bags, promoting events, and picking up collected rubbish or covering disposal fees.

While beach clean-ups help remove waste from the ocean, scientists stress that to solve the problem, we need to improve waste management around the globe, and reduce the amount of waste we create in the first place.

Three top tips to stop the plastic tide in Kāpiti:

Go for reusable – Reusable water bottles, coffee mugs, picnic supplies and shopping bags reduce the amount of single-use plastic we buy and throw out.
Stop litter – Don’t let plastic get away! Take care when packing your recycling crate to stop things blowing out. And remember that cigarette butts are plastic too.
Clean it up – Take part in a beach-clean up, or organise your own. Contact waste@kcdc.govt.nz for support and to find out if a clean up is coming up near you.

The sea monster will go on display in April – keep an eye on our Sustainable Communities Kāpiti facebook page to find out where and when! Many thanks to everyone who contributed to the project, including DOC for lending us their fabulous tent, the Otaihanga transfer station staff for helping JoAnna source some sea monster bones, the Ōtaki Kite Festival for being so accommodating, and of course our many helpers over the weekend.

Ocean plastic pollution in numbers:

In 2050, there will be more plastic in our oceans than fish
We now use 20 times more plastic globally than 50 years ago
Most plastic packaging is only used once before it‘s waste
8 million tons of plastic enters the ocean from land each year, mostly through stormwater runoff
Plastic bags are the second deadliest type of ocean trash