Sea Week 2019 - Celebrating our Ocean
Seaweek/ Kaupapa Moana is New Zealand’s annual national week celebrating the sea, hosted by the NZ Association for Environmental Education. It’s a time for all of us to get to know our ocean, its habitats, characteristics and inhabitants better.
This year Hauraki DOC chose to celebrate our oceans by working with local schools to support cleaning up Tikapa Moana and acknowledging others doing great work in caring for our marine environment.
Helena Myers, a Thames High school student, organised a morning of cleaning up the mangroves near the bird hide in Thames. Helena organised her first clean up in this area two years ago after seeing all the rubbish and realising that she wanted to make a difference. She asked friends and family if they wanted to help her and they were keen to get involved.
Helena said she is amazed how much support you get when you put it out there. This year over 30 people turned up and 27 bags of rubbish were removed from this special environment. Helena said “it’s great to see the amount of waste reducing since I started. Regular action and possibly the reduction in the use of plastic bags is making a real difference.”Thames High school outdoor education senior class chose to celebrate Sea Week by visiting Te Whanganui A Hei (Cathedral Cove) Marine Reserve for their first ocean snorkel. Having already developed their skills in the swimming pool and Hoffmans
pool in the Kauaeranga river, Sea Week provided the perfect opportunity to do an extended trip to a special protected area of water and get up close to underwater wildlife.
DOC staff worked with two schools to do beach clean ups. The Natural High outdoor class of Thames High School got into the thick of it wading through the mud of the mangroves at the head of the firth to remove rubbish. Old burley bags and other fishing debris were common finds but there were also a number of drink cans, old car tires, plastic bags and a hubcap. 16 Thames South School children from Ngaa Kahui Whetuu class (NKW2) did a great job picking up all rubbish they could find at Kuranui Bay. This beach is regularly cleaned by members of the public however the children still managed to remove one large bag of rubbish. During their time they also learnt about some of our marine wildlife and gathered materials for creating art projects back at school.
⚠️ DOGS DIE IN HOT CARS. If you love them, don't leave them. ⚠️
It's a message we share time and time again, and this year, we're calling on you to help us spread that message further.
Did you know that calls to SPCA about dogs left inside hot cars made up a whopping 11% of all welfare calls last summer? This is a completely preventable issue, and one which is causing hundreds of dogs (often loved pets) to suffer.
Here are some quick facts to share with the dog owners in your life:
👉 The temperature inside a car can heat to over 50°C in less than 15 minutes.
👉 Parking in the shade and cracking windows does little to help on a warm day. Dogs rely on panting to keep cool, which they can't do in a hot car.
👉 This puts dogs at a high risk of heatstroke - a serious condition for dogs, with a mortality rate between 39%-50%.
👉 It is an offence under the Animal Welfare Act to leave a dog in a hot vehicle if they are showing signs of heat stress. You can be fined, and prosecuted.
SPCA has created downloadable resources to help you spread the message even further. Posters, a flyer, and a social media tile can be downloaded from our website here: www.spca.nz...
We encourage you to use these - and ask your local businesses to display the posters if they can. Flyers can be kept in your car and handed out as needed.
This is a community problem, and one we cannot solve alone. Help us to prevent more tragedies this summer by sharing this post.
On behalf of the animals - thank you ❤️
Poll: Would you rather: Christmas in summer forever or winter forever?
Just a bit of a fun poll to get you thinking.
If you had to live out your Christmas days, would you prefer it was a summer Christmas or a winter Christmas?
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61.9% Summer
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36.6% Winter
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1.5% Other - I'll share below
Worst Xmas ever?
There's a a lot of planning that goes into Christmas day and sometimes things just don't go to plan. But it can be a good thing - a family mishap or hilarious memory that you can laugh about in Christmases to come.
Whether you burnt the dinner or were stranded at an airport...
Share your Christmas mishaps below!
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