The Assemblage for The Swan of the Exe

The assemblage for Vicky Jocher's sculpture of The Swan of the Exe is almost complete.Here's what's been gathered together. We could do with some more WHITE NETTING and some more bits of flotsam&jetsam

• Blue plastic dinghy found adrift at Dawlish Warren and causing a hazard. This was given to us by Teignbridge District Council

• Plastic tubes for mailing fishing rods, metal rods from Monica's garden
•   Roll of wire netting for the armature -  kindly donated by a Starcross resident

• garden canes - purchased from Starcross allotment committee

• tsunami of  plastic milkbottles. The bits of the milkbottles left over from feather-making, and the spare milkbottles, will all be recycled
• Here's some of the feathers which were made by people who came to the Celebration of Country Life in St Paul's Church, Starcross
  

•  Here's the feathers made and  attached to the trawler net by the children of Starcross Primary School yesterday 
  
• A trawler net given by Luci Coles from Trail Recycled Art in the Community. Here's Vicky and Monica snipping away in Luci's garden. Look at the detail on this handmade net. Before it was discovered drifting in the sea off Teignmouth, it would have been the livelihood for a family. It's sad to think of them, wherever they live, without their livelihood. Did their boat perish? How far has this fishing net drifted? Thousands of miles?

 There are thousands and thousands of miles of fishing net drifting around in the oceans. Here's a link about an Adidas project to make trainers from illegal gill nets.  The article from 5 Gyres points out that the solution lies in making a DIFFERENT plastic - one that won't break down into microscopic pieces and never decay...

Osprey chicks perish amongst parcel strapping

balloons present a great danger to wildlife

This urchin was saved from death by plastic

Many turtles die because they ingest plastic bags which have a strong resemblance to their natural prey which are jellyfish.

• Monica collected photographs of the terrible consequences of plastic. Can these be attached to the netting, or would it be better to use actual flotsam and jetsam to more clearly demonstrate the problem. Monica found a lot  on Dawlish Warren today. It was appropriate that she found a giant dog balloon....

since Monica has a giant dog... Here he is on Teignmouth back beach















No idea if Vicky will be able to use a giant dog balloon...

Here's some cuddly marine animals - a furry shark and a furry dolphin, a green starfish and a... frog.. (?!). It will have more impact to entangle these on the sculpture, instead of simply using pictures.

Vicky will decide tomorrow what she wants to use.

Another thing Teignbridge gave Monica today is rather spectacular. As the Teignbridge nature reserve warden at Dawlish Warren said - it could be said to be a marine creature - if it's a saltwater one.
It's bright. It's plastic. It was drifting in the sea off Dawlish Warren... but it's HUGE...
Do you think Vicky will use this enormous "Saltwater Crocodile" on her fabulous creation, or is it an alligator too far?