Toby was a small, leather back Turtle. He loved his family and friends but he especially loved his beach. His beach was clean and beautiful with bright pink sand and gorgeous pastel coloured shells. Toby liked naming the beaches when he went to visits his friends’ beaches. So, he decided to name his beach Shelly Bay!
Toby sunbathed and splashed in the water with nothing troubling on his mind. All his friends came to visit him on his beach often. Most of the time they told Toby to move to another beach but didn’t tell him why. He asked them why he should leave Shelly Bay but his friends wouldn’t tell him. He got confused and scared that something traumatizing was about to happen to him. Out of the blue every week toby would see people on Shelly Bay picking up things but he wasn’t sure what they were picking up.
The air started to get warmer, Shelly Bay started to become more and more crowded every day. Toby wasn’t enjoying the peace and quiet he used to. He started to see tiny brightly coloured objects floating past him and getting washed up on the beach. Everyday more of these brightly coloured objects were floating past him. The beach didn’t just start getting crowded with people it was getting crowded with plastic. Toby could no longer enter his own beach.
Toby was traumatized! The pieces of plastic started to get bigger and Toby was getting scared. Plastic was getting caught in Toby’s reef and he was struggling to get into his own home. Suddenly one day Toby was swimming around the coral reefs and something got caught to his fin. They were round and stuck together. It looked like some kind of can went in them. Toby was panicking. He swam to shore hoping someone would help him. An old man came up to him with his wife. They cut the plastic off with there metal knife they brought for there picnic. Toby was grateful and flapped his fins as he swam away. He left his beach and swam to his family that didn’t stay to far away from his beach. Toby ended up staying with his family for a few months until he found a new reef that he loved very much…
The End
Every day, on every beach, people are picking up plastic. Our use of plastics, and the fossil fuels made in their production, is already dangerous, but now as they are discarded onto the land and into the oceans, our life on earth is eating more contaminated food and is at greater risk of being ensnared. By trying to use less plastic, and by recycling what you do use, you can make a difference to the planets health and the health of the animals which share our planet with us