For the first five years of its annual clean-up of the waters of the Campbell River estuary, the Tyee Club of British Columbia focused on the stretch in front of its dock on Tyee Spit.
This year they moved across the estuary to add the area near the end of Perkins Road. They also combed the waters near their dock for tires and other material they missed.
“We’ve only done a third of the estuary,” said board member Phil Griffith. “We’re expanding out, and we’re not stopping until it’s done.”
In the new location, divers brought up a large pile of new tires, along with old bottles and cans, crab traps, a car battery and various other items.
“We’ve already got a little bit of everything this year again,” said board member Floyd Ross.
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Some of the material was litter, but in many cases with the tires, they had been used on docks as bumpers but eventually began to break down and dropped into the waters, eventually sinking to the bottom. They continue to break down and get into the food chain.
One obvious reason for the project is simply to remove junk that does not belong there. Another major benefit though is that getting rid of old tires and other items helps promote the growth of plant life on the bottom of the estuary, which in turn promotes the ecosystem for fish to survive.
“Once you remove those tires off the bottom, it gives the eelgrass the ability to grow, and that’s happening,” Ross said. “The more eelgrass there is, the more the fry fingerlings have places to hide from predators.”
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The project has represented the efforts of many volunteers and groups working with the Tyee Club, with funding from the Campbell River Salmon Foundation, the Pacific Salmon Foundation and the Rotary Clubs of Campbell River. Other partners include Pacificus Biological Consulting, C&L Supply Rentals, the local dragon boat team and DiveSafe International, which sent divers to help bring up the junk from the bottom. Griffith also had a couple of volunteer students interested in biology from the Carihi fly fishing club to help out on the boats.
“It’s a community effort,” he added.
The clean-up first started when the club noticed some tires on the bottom of the estuary while it was replacing its wharf.
“We sent a diver down, we could see five or six tires, and the diver stopped sending them up when we hit 50,” Griffith said.
The club soon realized it was a problem for the estuary as a whole, even though the area looked pristine on the surface.
“We looked left and right … realized there’s been docks, left and right, and for the next few hundred yards, for 50 years, and everybody uses tires as bumpers,” he said.
Griffith emphasizes the aim is not hand out blame to anyone but to work as a group to clean up the area.
“We’re not pointing fingers at anybody, we’re just doing it,” he said.
Over the years, they have pulled up more than 500 tires from the 400-yard stretch below the surface inside the Tyee Spit, and the club estimates there are probably a couple of hundred more tires still down there, along with other refuse. They have also located three sunken boats and know there’s an old sailboat down there that will require a lot of effort to remove.
“One of these days we’re gonna get the sailboat off the bottom,” said Ross. “That’d be a major job…. We’re not quite sure how to get it up at this point…. but it will happen.”
