It has been more than a decade since COASST first received a grant from the National Science Foundation to design our marine debris data module. With the closure of active data collection for that module at the beginning of 2025, we are drawn to commemorate the program in more than numbers on a spreadsheet. Looking for and finding trash in environments we all love can be disheartening, but the COASSTers who took part in the debris program managed to find humor and interest in an occasionally depressing task.
See below for some of the best finds, jokes, and oddities over the years. Most from debris surveyors, but some from beached bird surveyors who felt compelled to share.
Military related and/or potentially hazardous items are not immune to being trash on the beach. COASSTers took charge and got lots of those removed safely by trained professionals. The Russian Sonobuoy even got picked up by the Navy!
Various oddities arrived on our beaches like a sword in a stone, a whole life raft, 13 bags of powdered milk, and more.
13 bags of powdered milk A knife stuck inside a stone Something shaped like a cat Competition throwing knives A life raft from the wreckage of the Wooden Mistress A long knife Sea glass reading “Swamp Root: Kidney Liver and Bladder Cure.” This “cure” was sold around 1876. it was declared “quack medicine” by the FDA in 1906.
Occasional container spills meant large amounts of random items washing up. Coolers, Crocs, and helmets were some of those.
Some items were funny, ironic, or just made our surveyors feel silly. Whether that be a rusty truck at a sign prohibiting vehicles, or taking photos of a bag of dog poop, folks did it for science!
Did we miss something that you found? Send a photo (or clues to help us find it in the database) over to coasst@uw.edu and we will add the photos we get below:
