Oceanarium, Bournemouth teams up with Marine Conservation Society to launch public beach cleans

The Oceanarium Bournemouth has joined forces with the Marine Conservation Society, to tackle littering on Bournemouth beach, and since its successful launch on Sunday 02 March 2025, Oceanarium’s dedicated education hosts and helpful volunteers have already collected a whopping 137 kg of litter.  

Determined to make a difference, Oceanarium staff will be encouraging volunteers to take part in beach clean events on the first Sunday of every month, recording the items they collect, in collaboration with the Marine Conservation Society.

Littering has become a significant issue in Bournemouth, especially during the busy summer season. Last Summer, the Oceanarium team were devastated to discover Bournemouth beach covered with litter. In 2024 alone, the Oceanarium team and volunteers collected over 318kg of litter, most of which consisted of cigarette butts, plastic packaging and debris from fishing boats. 

Determined to make a difference, the Oceanarium’s goal is to clean up Bournemouth’s beaches, raise awareness of the negative impact of littering, the consequences it has on our beaches, and its detrimental impact on our oceans and wildlife.

Head of Aquatics, Oliver Buttling said “We are delighted to receive so much support for our public beach cleans and it’s inspiring to see so many people getting involved. It’s deeply concerning to witness the disregard for our beaches, and we hope our beach clean efforts will inspire more people to engage with environmental conservation. We hope this will fuel more awareness and education into the environmental issues littering causes. Our success with this so far has been thanks to our dedicated education hosts, who are committed to engaging with the public daily, to encourage the community to help protect our natural world for future generations.”

If you would like to get involved with the next beach clean, it will be taking place on Sunday 1st June at 2:00pm. Sign up via this link. 

Schools can now add a beach clean to their Oceanarium visit too. The Marine Conservation Society has supplied the Oceanarium with litter picker equipment to cater for school groups. For more information, please do get in touch via email to [email protected].

The Oceanarium would like to express its heartfelt thanks to all the volunteers who have already participated in the beach clean-ups, particularly to those who travelled a distance to be there and lend their support.