Foreshore foresight, indeed!

12.02. 2009

The headline of the story by Bill Hoffman in the Sunshine Coast Daily on 28 November says it all. His story is about initiatives and community partnerships at the Mudjimba Beach Surf Life Saving Club (QLD), including the new morning turtle track patrols of Maroochy River north shore beaches.

The article is reprinted here with the kind permission of Sunshine Coast Daily – see the full article and this photo of Mudjimba Surf Life Saving Club Captain Kaitlyn Akers (centre) with Sheridan Holford and Michelle Jones online at http://www.thedaily.com.au/news/2008/nov/28/mudjimba-beach-surf-life-saving-ecosurf/

Foreshore foresight
A Sunshine Coast surf life saving club has joined a national program which aims to better protect the ecologically sensitive coastal environment in which it operates.

The Surf Life Saving Australia Ecosurf program wants clubs to accept greater stewardship of their coastal location through environmentally-friendly practices, education and awareness and engagement in the active care of the dunal systems.

As such, Mudjimba Beach Surf Life Saving Club will begin morning turtle track patrols of Maroochy River north shore beaches.

This will be one more step in its engagement with a program that may also see it form alliances with groups like Coolum District Coast Care and the Mudjimba Residents Association.

Club captain Kaitlyn Akers was excited about involvement in Ecosurf.

She said it aligned with the Coast’s future direction of being sustainable and green and also that the club hoped to engage across all community groups.

“It’s not just about the surf club, it’s about Mudjimba and the future we all want for Mudjimba, our members and our kids,’’ she said.

“We hope this will encourage members to look at their own workplaces and homes to develop sustainable practices.’’

Mudjimba SLSC will look at reducing its clubhouse energy use and has applied for a grant to install a water tank to allow it to come off the water grid.

To better manage waste, they will place rubbish bins on the beach, which would be removed at the completion of patrols.

“They’re just little things but they can make a big difference,’’ Ms Akers said.

Coolum Coast Care is working with the Mudjimba Residents Association to establish a dune restoration group, something in which the surf club may also become involved in.

During the last turtle nesting season, there were three identified loggerhead turtle sites between Mudjimba and the river mouth.

Ms Akers said it was a “no brainer’’ that the club, which runs four roving patrols a day along that stretch of beach, should become involved in identifying nest sites so that they could be adequately protected.

Member Don Parry, who is assisting in the club’s Ecosurf engagement, said surf life saving clubs occupied privileged positions on the foreshore and needed to take their responsibilities seriously.

Mr Parry said if they wanted to retain the position they now held, clubs needed to not only be responsible and do the right things but also to look at ways they could actively sustain that environment.

“There are no walls between this club and the community,’’ he said.

The club has already been approached by two University of the Sunshine Coast students doing sustainability majors who want to get involved in the project.

“We are hopeful that other coast surf life saving clubs will also get involved,’ Mr Parry said.

Surf Life Saving Australia hopes that a nationally cooperative approach to protecting the coastal and beach environment will benefit all surf lifesavers and associated communities.

It sees those as beach protection and sustainability, waste and pollution reduction, a reduction in environmental impacts on ecosystems, conservation of natural resources and improved water quality.