National Marine Week is a chance to celebrate the wonderful wildlife and incredible habitats around our seas which are home to over half of all our wildlife (more than 30,000 species), contribute to flood management and water purification, and provide the oxygen for every other breath you take!

There are lots of ways you can get involved in Somerset to help us take action for our own special 53-mile-long coast as part of our Somerset’s Wilder Coast project - funded by Hinkley ‘C’ Community Fund and the National Lottery’s Climate Action Fund.

As well as working with communities from Minehead to Brean on their own local projects to better connect people to coastal wildlife and habitats, we are also running various citizen science surveys. Our Shoresearch volunteers go out to different beaches once a month to survey intertidal life. No previous knowledge is needed and it’s a great way to get to know more about our rocky and muddy shores. We also run monthly Sea Watch surveys looking out for porpoises, seals and other sea mammals.

This year we are particularly focussing on young people. Our Shoresearch team will be at Dunster Beach on 4^th August and we are inviting along 14- 18 year olds who might be interested in the marine sciences as a career or just have a passion for protecting our Oceans. Experts, including some of our existing younger volunteers, will be on hand to explain what we do and to help the young people learn how to identify and survey marine life. We also have a Somerset School Coastal Champions Award which already has 20 schools signed up through which we  support schools and youth organisations to get more engaged with the coast.

Although the seashores of Bristol Channel may at first not appear to be as appealing as the those in Devon on Cornwall, we have just as much diversity and special and fascinating species and of course all our seas are really part of one large Ocean and Somerset’s shores need to be studied and protected as much as anywhere else as they face increasing threats from climate change and pollution. Why not get your wellies on and join us on the beach!

To find out more about any of the above events or projects visit our website https://www.somersetwildlife.org/what-we-do/create-priority-landscapes/somersets-wilder-coast

Or contact Mark Ward at mark.ward@somersetwildlife.org