Category: Bees, Butterflies, Birds (Non Humanoid Life)

November 17, 2019

by drplasticpicker

Last Friday the topic of conversation in the pediatric office lunchroom was persimmons. My blogpost on Squeasy Gear https://squeasygear.com/ and the Pediatric Fiber Deficit https://drplasticpicker.com/squeasy-gear-1-tackling-the-pediatric-fiber-deficit-with-real-fruit-and-not-plastic/ led to many interesting conversations in clinic about the benefits of persimmons. Then we heard from one of our lead nurses that his sister was considering chopping down this tree that is flourishing in the middle of Long Beach, California.

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November 16, 2019

An original poem by drplasticpicker

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November 14, 2019

by drplasticpicker

It is 5am, and my body is awake and time for a bit of coffee and blogging. When the earth awakens and the sun begins to rise, I will head off on my morning walk. But before then I wanted to share with you how drplasticpicker gained attention from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography!

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November 11, 2019

by drplasticpicker

Brandt’s Comorants, Whimbrelshttps://drplasticpicker.com/way-of-the-whimbrel/, Long-billed Curlews, Snowy Egrets, Great Blue Herons, Black Turnstones, Western Gulls, Marbled Godwits, one Surfbird and Snowy Plovers. These are the threatened Pacific coastal birds I saw on one of my ocean plastic picking walks.

The half-mile stretch of beach I clean most mornings is the southernmost tip of the South La Jolla Marine Protected Area.

November 2, 2019

by drplasticpicker

It has been a busy few days with being out of town and catching up with normal work and family responsibilities, but I took a vacation day since the kids were off due to one of those random Professional Developmental Days. I was able to leave for my quick jog to the shore, and spent 45 minutes wandering along the coastline since there was no drop-off this morning. Midway along my walk with only 1/3 bag full, I spied something I had never seen before!

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October 16, 2019

by drplasticpicker

I had adventures this morning! Drplasticpicker was up before sunrise and I met a wondrous sight. I try to clean at the ocean’s edge and along the sand cliffs, and sometimes I’ll pick ocean plastic on the main beach. I’ve seen sand being brought it to rebuild the beach, but wondered how the beach itself was cleaned? Now, I have seen it with my own eyes! It is cleaned by the Surf Rake, a tractor-towed beach cleaner.

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October 7, 2019

by drplasticpicker

The Sea Turtle is our Spirit Animal. Why the sea turtle? The sea turtle is a marine and terrestrial animal. It’s life cycle starts on the sandy beaches where they hatch and then crawl to the ocean, the kelp where they live their first years, the great ocean during their adult lives, and back to the same beaches where they return to nest. The sea turtle is acutely vulnerable to ocean plastic, since as young sea turtles they live amongst the kelp beds and sometimes mistake bits of plastic for food. Sea turtles are also beautiful and majestic. The Sea Turtle is our spirit animal, because drplasticpicker hopes to be like the turtle – every day being consistent and persistent in our ocean plastic picking. Although the sea turtle is not a tortoise, it is related. Like the hare and the tortoise parable, the tortoise will win the race against ocean plastic debris.

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