Fellow eastern Lake Erie and western Lake Ontario surfers let's have a beach clean up and a day of Surfing Infringement Festival for the wave riding, beach access, and the environment at The Palmwood (Crystal Beach Waterfront Park) on Sunday 28 September 2008.

http://www.vanaqua.org/cleanup/dropins.php?province_id=9


We will do the TD Bank: Great Canadian Beach Clean Up in the morning at The Palmwood surf break in Crystal Beach to demonstrate good deeds by the local surfing community and to show the local population and elected officials that this spot is a surfing beach that we want preserved and protected for all recreational users and to do positive, fun deeds to play the joy of surfing forward.


It would be cool if we could invite various environmental organizations to come and set up tables. We could do jet ski tow surfing for youngsters in the local community or push them into waves if the surf comes up. Does anybody have a jet ski? It would be cool to have some accoustical music there too. Use your imagination. No idea will be discounted without consideration.


As the President of the oldest and most disorganized surf club in the Great Lakes I call for Wyldwooders to rise up. We take direction from our hero Richard Feynman and do things in the name of fun and discovery. We hold our board meetings in the water. We have abolished all committees and rules of order and instead embraced the flow of photons and wave energies.

As the Co-Director of the Eastern Surfing Association Great Lakes-East Lakes District which is part of the best organized, amateur, surfing organization on the planet I call for member support of our Surfer Infringement Festival.


As a one of the oldest surviving local Great Lakes surfers who has surfed four lakes with two eyes and Lake Superior and the Habitat wave in Montreal with one eye I invite all cancer survivors to heal with us at the water and waves if we get them.


Please contact me as soon as possible and right here or on my telephone in Buffalo with your ideas for our Great Lakes Surfer Infringement Festival.



All Volunteers welcome.


We will have to contact the government of Fort Erie about our idea. We are going non commercial on this. However we will seek to obtain clearance from the Fort Erie government for any sponsors of this event besides the TD Bank and the Vancouver Aquarium.

The beach clean up is an opportunity to morph this day into a day that is inclusive to water fun and cleaning up our lakes.

The above title is an idea for the festival.

will be there for sure. thanks for organizing these events!

Thanks for the response so far I got calls too and will be getting back to all who want to assist. I need to run this by Fort Erie before I can advance the idea. I think they won't object.

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On Friday September 5, 2008 I received a package from the Great Canadian Beach Clean Up that I'm moving forward on planning as the local coordinator in Crystal Beach at The Palmwood. The envelope contained tabulation sheets which we use to tally up the items we collect and forward them back to the Vancouver Aquarium in British Columbia. These sheets identify the sources of garbage and debris we collect and provide statistics and information that are valuable towards getting a lid and eventually a positive change for the beach environment where we play with our families and surf the waves. The packet also contained plastic gloves, garbage bags, and a coordinators ball cap so that people might know who I am. That's funny. Than again like last year we may have total strangers show up and pitch in a hand. Last year a resident and his two sons walked up and became part of our team that scoured the entire Palmwood surf area and Crystal Beach Waterfront Park clean of throw away garbage on the ground and in the parking lot boulder walls. The envelope from the TD Great Canadian Beach Clean Up also contained waiver forms that all participants joining in the beach clean up are required to sign.


The utmost importance in this effort is to restore the beach area and shoreline cleaner than we found it, while making sure we do things safely, methodically, and have fun in the process. Beach clean ups are best when friends and like minded caring people come together in a positive vibe to make a difference. These unselfish efforts are in my opinion what is best in humanity. We live in a world of mass consumption and capitalistic competition. Sometimes we can't see the trees from the forest or the shoreline from the lake as we wiz down the highway to our jobs. appointments, families, and other enagements. In our hastiness the trees and the sand on the beach all blend together. The sum of the total of the big picture is equal to all of it's parts. If environments and habitats are destroyed on a whim like someone throwing a cigarette butt on the beach or a bottle or wrapper. These actions are taken by those who view the planet as a kid in a movie theatre who sweeps up the popcorn on the floor as if nature has the ability to be a cyber game or some instant gratification. I think of how the Roman Empire used to take animals and people from across their ancient lands and use them as slaves or entertainment in brutal games of blood thirsty combat and slaughter, or how in Japan every year dolphins are rounded up en masse for a tradition that harkens back to the time of whale hunting for lamp oil or when the Great Lakes sturgeon fish was caught for use to make fires. (The Great Lakes sturgeon is a fish that harkens back to the time of the dinosaurs on this planet. They are like fresh water salmon that swim up river to lay their eggs.) The selfish rationaizations that exploit animals and species and environments are not derived in cultures that honor and respect our planets environment. As a matter of fact the process that inculcates waste of resources and environments is not based upon the intelligence of ancient people who lived off the water and nature and guarded it and lived in a symbiotic relationship with it. There were ancient cultures of people who also exploited their environment and are no longer around because of it. Once there were forests across Easter Island. Once upon a time England and Spain were covered in forests that were exploited for warfare or fire making. Currently we see California highway authorites wanting to build a highway through Trestles but surfers are standing up to these missionaries of ignorance. There is significance and importance in all our surf beaches to surfers who are the canaries in the coal mines on the shorelines of this planet. I shudder to hear so called leaders in my country talk about drill, drill, drill, clean coal burning plants (?), that are some facade, and building more nuclear power plants when their is an abundence of wind, solar, geo thermal, and other new undeveloped and suppressed tchnologies that are better than more of the same. What I have written here are my personal opinions and not those of the ESA or Wyldewood Surf Club. However I know of no true surfer who believes that throwing trash on a beach reflects the culture and best in what it is to be a surfer. What I write here is from the heart of Magilla Schaus the surfer, but a the same time I must be respectful of ESA and Wyldewood or Great Canadian Beach Clean up members who do not agree with my environment and political views. However to broach these environment matters is my right as a surfer who respects the beach and the waves I ride. I too am responsible towards creating the process that must call for good stewardship of the environment of this planet and the use of it's resources in a way that returns them to the state they were found in or better than they were found in. The way I consume or leave the beach reflects intelligence from Great watermen or either that of careless selfishness. To strike a balence means to find ways to correct the injustices without doing harm while helping others. One need not have to be a celebrity or powerful person to empower themselves into a person of enlightenment and understanding.

These things I write from out of my love of surfing waves and from seeing great wonders big and small that are all around us and not created by the hands of any one person. The ride comes to an end sooner or later. My hope is these words will inspire the local surfers to someday pick up where I left off.

Giving other surfers an opportunity to compete in amateur surf contests, or to carry on a decades long tradition of Wyldewood Board Meetings in the waves, with fellow U.S. and Canadian surfers in Lake Erie and Ontario, and doing beach clean ups at our surf breaks in Lakes Erie and Ontario are something that I hope will live on when I have gone.

To my fellow surfers it is always excellent to ride with you and find happiness in the riding and sharing of the waves. There is the zone, the barrel, the ultimate ride.

All invited to our beach clean up in the name of leaving nothing behind but our foot prints in the sand.


http://www.vanaqua.org/cleanup/dropins.php?province_id=9

Great Canadian Shoreline Cleanup

It's here again, the TD Great Canadian Shoreline Cleanup, which takes place from Sept. 20-28. It used to be that this cleanup turned up everything but the kitchen sink, until last year when they actually did find a kitchen sink! The TD Great Canadian Shoreline Cleanup is one of the largest conservation initiatives of the Vancouver Aquarium. It started 15 years ago as a small beach cleanup by four Vancouver Aquarium employees and has continued on, allowing people from all regions and all walks of life to make a positive difference to their environment.
More Info.

This coincides with International Coastal Cleanup Day on September 20 that many Surfrider Foundation Chapters are participating in click here for more info.





Magilla Schaus: Come rain or shine the clean up must go on Sunday 28 September 2008- Lake Erie-Fort Erie-The Palmwood Surf Break-Crystal Beach Waterfront Park.

The clean up goes on. Hope I get 15 volunteers for the clean up.

Please bring your own gloves and one heavy trash bag.


Thanks

Help Wanted for 7 a.m. dawn patrol beach clean up tomorrow at The Palmwood.

Please bring gloves and a garbage bag.

We are going to comb the rock break walls and shores of our historic surf break. Tims has not called me back despite giving the local C.B. store a type written request. Oh well. Anybody needing coffee that cam't afford one I will buy.

Many hands make light work.


Leave nothing behind but your foot prints in the sand. We move forward.

i will see you in the mornging... i have gloves for all....

GH

Thanks George for bringing gloves.

See everyone in the morning.

Thanks for your help today at The Palmwood-Crystal Beach Waterfront Park in Fort Erie on Lake Erie.

The following surfers and diver helped clean up The Palmwood today as part of the TD Great Canadian Beach Clean Up:

Chris Furminger form Niagara Region

George Holmes from Niagara Region

Dirk Warnas from GTA/Nova Scotia

Neil Fraser from GTA

Cristine from Buffalo


Magilla Schaus-Site Coordinator of TD Great Canadian Beach Clean



Thank You


Tim Hortons in Crystal Beach, Ontario, Canada






for the donation of the coffee and the doughnuts


for our beach clean up volunteers.

Here are some of the shots taken from Sunday Shoreline clean up, Good Work Team!

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On Sunday 28 September 2008 a 7:00 a.m. dawn patrol beach clean up was conducted by members of the Wyldewood Surf Club, The Toronto Surf Club, and a diver instructor from the Niagara Region as part of the TD Great Canadian Shoreline Cleanup at The Crystal Beach Waterfront Park in Fort Erie, Ontaro, Canada on Lake Erie's shores.

We found out that this Canadian Park is basically a giant ash tray. The largest item we picked up and counted was 2854 cigarette filters. Cigarette filters are made from cellulose acetate. The cellulose acetate filters are not biodegradable and release toxic waste into the water and kill small life forms in the water. This must be changed. A surfer who throws a cigarette butt into the water or onto a sandy beach is littering and contributing to harming the environment.

If you smoke cigarettes you are exposing yourself to early death from cancer. If you are smoking and improperly disposing your cigareete butts on the ground or on the beach you are polluting our waves.

Please read this:

http://www.longwood.edu/cleanva/ciglitterarticle.html


An AWESOME Thank You to:

Wyldewood Surf Club

Toronto Surf Club

Eastern Surfing Association Great Lakes District

the Origin web site

To a Niagara and Humber Bay diver

Tim Hortons in Crystal Beach/Fort Erie


On Tuesday the 30th of September 2008 I electronically entered our beach clean up results into the headquarters for the TD Great Canadian Shoreline Clean Up.

This is what we removed and placed into garbage bags from the beach, the break walls, the grass, and the parking lot at The Crystal Beach Waterfrint Park:


Shoreline and Recreational Activities Litter:

14 Bags (Paper)

36 Bags (Plastic)

8 Ballons

24 Beverage Bottles (Plastic) 2 liters or less

25 Glass Beverage Bottles

42 Beverage Cans

104 Caps, Lids

3 Clothing, Shoes

144 Cups, Plates, Forks, Knives, Spoons

38 Food Wrappers/Containers

7 Pull Tabs

10 6-Pack Holders

16 Shotgun Shells/Wadding

55 Straws, Stirrers

4 Toys

2 Tin Foil

21 Pieces of Paper

14 Misc. Plastic Pieces


Ocean/Waterfront Actvities Litter:

7 Bait Containers

2 Bleach/Cleaner Bottles

0 Buoys/Floats

0 Crab/Lobster/Fish Traps

1 Crates

7 Fishing Line

2 Fishing Lures/Light Sticks

0 Fishing Nets

0 Light Bulbs//Tubes

1 Oil/Lube Bottles

0 Pallets

0 Plastic Sheeting/Tarps

7 Rope

1 Strapping Bands


Smoking Related Activities Litter:

2854 Cigarettes/Cigarette Filters

9 Cigarette Lighters

70 Cigar Tips

31 Tobacco Packaging/Wrappers


Dumping Activity Garbage:

0 Appliances (refrigerators, washers, etc.)

0 Batteries

38 Building Materials

10 Shingles

4 Car Parts

0 55-Gal. Drums

0 Tires

1 Car Deoderizer in the shape of a maple leaf


Medical/Personal Hygiene Waste:


4 Condoms

0 Diapers

1 Syringe

9 Tampons/Tampon Applicators

1 Plastic Glove


Debris Items Of Local Concern:

10 Dog Manure

1 Bubble Wrap

1 Metal Pipe

1 Pair of Scissors



6 Number of People Who Worked In Clean Up

.5 Distance Cleaned

11 Trash Bags Filled

120 Estimated Total Weight of Debris Removed

4 Estimated Hours Worked