FURNESS residents hit Bardsea beach to kickstart what they hope will grow into a larger and more regular clean-up initiative for 2020.

Tim Faudemeer, one of the clean-up’s organisers, said: “We’ve noticed a significant amount of rubbish on our beaches. Some of it large, but much of it less than the size of a penny piece, and often as small as a grain of rice. These items are the most deadly to our ecosystem and Cumbrian wildlife. It kills fish, sea mammals, mammals that live by the sea, birds and livestock.

“Whilst neither my wife or I are ecological experts we do recognise that something needs to be done to try and reverse the trend of more and more rubbish arriving on our shoreline. So our goal is to arrange a number of beach clean events, hopefully with support from lots of local volunteers to try and get some of this rubbish off the beach.”