Volunteers clean up shoreline trash in Stanley Park [Video]

Volunteers and staff members gathered along Vancouver’s Stanley Park Seawall Saturday to pick up litter as part of International Coastal Cleanup Day.

The effort was spearheaded by Ocean Wise, the Vancouver Aquarium and the Stanley Park Ecology Society, who say they are on a mission to restore and protect the ocean.

“It’s important for us to get this litter off the shoreline, especially all that plastic we’re seeing because it is detrimental to the health of the ecosystem, the animals, the life that’s there, as well as—I don’t think any of us want to look at it,” said Daphne Austin, education manager with Ocean Wise.

“By doing that we’re preventing that plastic and litter from entering our waterways, entering the ocean and therefore being harder to pick up and remove from the environment.”

The crew of coastal cleaners find all manner of trash such as food wrappers, bottle caps and …