Rockpooling at Jackie's Beach, Whitburn

So, there has been a huge lack of photos and adventures in general from Jackie's beach this year. With my health issues, we just haven't been to many places at all, including one of our favourite little bays where we were a part of the Nesting Ringed Plover Project 2023*, however as I emerged from my aestivation (and the schools had returned) Mr H and I ventured down for a slow walk on September 9th. 
I'd failed to check the tide times before arriving and as you'll see from the photos, the sea was very far away from the shore. This did give us the opportunity to explore the life within the rockpools though! A common activity when I was a child, I've always loved rockpool hunting but in recent years the number of creatures has been noticeably less, however on this trip I was pleasantly surprised with our findings...

*We were meant to be volunteering this year too, but evidently couldn't and I'm gutted because it was an incredibly successful season and I missed out on seeing all the babies!

 

From birds and bugs to crustaceans, fish and more I was over the moon with our findings. It was a wonderful day back at Jackie's Beach, we're so lucky to have such a special area so close to us. 

Earth Day 2024

 

Earth Day is celebrated on the 22nd of April every year and is an event with the aim of drawing attention to the importance of our planet and protecting it's enviroment. 2024's Earth Day focus was on plastic pollution and the impact it has on everything, including the physical health of humanity and our living creatures. Plastic polution, from single use plastics, fast fashion, mircoplastics and everything in between is an urgent threat to our world and needs to be addressed more seriously by all now.

Read more about Earth Day here > Earth Day 2024 | Activities & Resources for April 22 - Earth Day

As someone who feels so interconnected with the Earth and Mother Nature, I love to try and do something outdoors appreciating our planet every year. However, I've actually not published a blog post about Earth Day since 2021! (Which you can see here > Underland to Wonderland: Earth Day 2021) 

Below are the photos from our day this year.

This year Mr H and I took a trip down to a special place. The beach where last year (and this year!) we were a part of the Ringed Plover Nesting Project and in general just a gorgous, important little part of our coastline. As always I had to pop my feet in the sea, we also did a bit of a litter pick and of course I  was on bird spotting duty. 
As you'll see from the above photos we took a different route to the beach for the first time. Whitburn Point Nature Reserve sits right between the car park and cliffs and like everywhere we've been around here I have no idea why we hadn't venture through it before. 
Though there was no sign of our beloved Ringed Plover, we were lucky enough to see many other little beauties including Sand Martin, Greenfinch, Linnet, Rock Dove, Goldfinch, Cormorant, Turnstone, Rockpipit, Eider Duck and Carrion Crow. It was a lovely day.

I hope you did something for our planet this Earth Day. If not, no worries! Every day is Earth Day! Go do something today!